


DESTROYA

by LilithKawanami



Series: Villain!Klaus [3]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (Comics), The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: (Does he get one?), (probably not), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Klaus Hargreeves, F/M, Ghost Mentor, In Control of his Powers Klaus Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Klaus Hargreeves-centric, M/M, No Beta, Powerful Klaus Hargreeves, Sober Klaus Hargreeves, Telekinetic Klaus Hargreeves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-13
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:15:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 49,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23629876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilithKawanami/pseuds/LilithKawanami
Summary: Because Vanya isn't the only one with a villain's backstory. Because Klaus was raised by a psychopath ghost instead of a sociopath billionaire. Because under a different influence, Klaus is genuinely powerful rather than an addict.And that changes things.Featuring a still snarky but actually competent Klaus who has kind of had enough of all the family drama, but sticks around anyways just to see what happens.And what happens is he learns a thing or two about himself, his past, and the apocalypse.(3rd part in the series, at least part 1 is recommended for understanding, but both part 1 & 2 are necessary for full enjoyment)
Relationships: Dave/Klaus Hargreeves, Vanya Hargreeves/Leonard Peabody
Series: Villain!Klaus [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1310174
Comments: 193
Kudos: 648
Collections: Finished faves, Numerous OTPS Infinite Fandoms





	1. Chapter 1

**_Chapter 1_ **

New York was exactly how he remembered it, and so was the mansion. How his bastard of a father had managed to buy up and keep a whole block of the city was a mystery he'd never questioned as a kid, but now he just assumed the eldest Hargreeves had his own less-than-respectable business practices going on. It didn't matter much to him anyways. While the others might be hoping for some form of inheritance, Klaus didn't really need the money (although he definitely wouldn't refuse it if it was offered - that was kind of his whole shtick). From the brief research he conducted on his way back to the city, he and Allison seemed to be the only two Hargreeves who worked out how to profit off their powers (he'd give up his own more-than-modest fortune if she hadn't rumored her way to her celebrity status). Five disappeared (although he certainly wasn't dead), Ben died, Luther stayed as far up Dad's ass as possible and went to live on the moon, Diego flunked from police academy and now stalked the streets as a vigilante, and Vanya was buried in her violin, just like when they were kids. He was still sort of annoyed with her after her bullshit book, though. 

She'd pegged him for a junkie, and while once it might have been true, might have been how he ended up, there was a lot dearest Number Seven had missed. Now, it was true he enjoyed his parties, and he indulged on a semi-frequent basis, but he didn't require the drugs to function - not after he got the hang of dismissing spirits. His problem before was that the drugs were the only absolute way to make them leave him alone. On occasion he could dismiss them like he did the first night he became aware of his telekinesis, but it was unpredictable. Drugs were easier and allowed him time to think in peace. Frank cautioned him, taught him how to use without going too far (although he, too, disappeared when the bliss took over - that more than anything kept him from abusing too often. He didn’t like being away from Frank for too long). Vanya didn't even know Frank existed, didn't know the limits they'd worked out, didn't know what happened behind closed doors. She only saw her own suffering and didn't care that  _ all _ of them had been fucked over by Dad, some worse than others. Klaus would've taken normal over some of Father's experiments any day. After the book, he'd been recognized more frequently, which made people take him less seriously. He was just a junkie, after all - easy to dispose of. A few of his targets swiftly learned that wasn't the case.

He didn't doubt all of his siblings had also read the book and had the same mental image of him as Vanya. When he made the decision to return to the city for the funeral, he also decided that he absolutely should not show his siblings the real person he had become. Let them have their derisive thoughts - it was better than any of them deciding he was a threat to be disposed of (he definitely wouldn't put it past Luther).

Klaus continued rifling through his father's office, pocketing interesting trinkets. An extremely expensive looking box caught his eye, and when shaken revealed what sounded like papers and a book. He tucked that away into his waistband, the flair of his coat hiding the shape. Pawning the old man’s so carefully collected crap would be wonderful. He didn’t need the money, but he liked the thought of taking something from the man. His father had often cared more about these stupid trinkets than any of them. 

“You ought to look for his notes on all of your powers,” Frank suggested. “Could be an interesting read.”

“Right! Good plan. I want to see what the bastard wrote about me!” he renewed his rifling through the drawers, looking for that damned notebook of his.

“Klaus?” a familiar feminine voice questioned. Klaus resisted the urge to place his hands over his ears at the sound of her voice, and instead pulled himself out from underneath the desk, search at least temporarily concluded. “What are you doing?”

“Oh! Allison,” Klaus gave her a massive smile, pretending the very sight of her didn’t make his skin crawl (he remembered all the times she rumored him - the times she got Luther to beat him up for her…). She was gorgeous as always, but what else was expected from a movie star? “Wow, is that you? Hey, come here, long time!” he pulled her into a hug. 

“Too long,” she responded, pretending she was a caring sibling. 

“Hey, I was hoping to see you actually,” he lied to her with a happy tone, “because I wanted to get your autograph! Add it to my collection,” he flashed her an adoring smile, appealing to that ego he knew was lurking just below the surface. 

She scanned him up and down, clearly looking for signs to confirm her negative opinion of him. He’d still been using drugs and alcohol on occasion to manage the spirits when they had last seen each other. If anyone thought he was a junkie, he was sure it would be Allison. She'd always been the most shallow of the siblings and never even bothered trying to look past her preconceptions. She wouldn’t find the signs of drug abuse she was expecting, but her eyes lingered on his tight, leather pants, fur lined coat, and mesh top. The eyeliner probably didn’t hurt either. 

She still looked highly suspicious, so he continued speaking. “I just came down here to prove to myself that the old man was really gone. And he is! He’s dead! Yeah!” he clapped, watching her expression switch to bemused. “You know how I know? Because if he were alive, not one of us would be allowed to set foot in this room.” Allison became more maudlin at that response, glancing around at the various items spread before them. Klaus sat himself in the chair and tossed his feet up on the desk. “He was always in here, our whole childhood. Plotting his next torment, right? Remember how he used to look at us? That scowl?” he pointed at the severe looking portrait hanging on the wall. Who needed a portrait of themselves hanging in their office? He’d always wanted to deface the portraits around the house, but Frank managed to talk him out of it at the last second each time. (Most of the time...there were a few portraits squirrelled away in the attic that no one ever bothered looking at anyways.)

“There’s good ole Number One, sneaking around the corner. Interesting that he even tried to sneak, considering how big he’s gotten,” Frank cut in. Klaus avoided glancing in his direction like a professional, continuing to entertain Allison. 

“Thank Christ he’s not our real father so we couldn’t inherit those cold, dead eyes!” he used his fingers to emphasize his point, letting out a mock yell. Frank probably warned him so he could switch to a more appropriate behavior around the former team leader, but he and Klaus had always had different ideas of appropriate behavior anyways, so Klaus didn’t see the point. (And if he also didn't want to take his eyes off the biggest threat in the house - what was super strength or accuracy in the face of reality manipulation? - well, that was only reasonable.) “Number Three!” Allison giggled at him, even as Luther chose that moment to intrude. 

“Get out of his chair.” It was almost amusing how Luther attempted to mimic their father’s severity all while looking like a circus freak. 

“Oh, wow, Luther! You really filled out over the years, huh?” he stood from the chair, making a mocking gesture at his “older” brother. 

“Klaus,” he received a glower in response. 

“Save the lecture, I was already leaving. You guys can talk amongst yourselves,” he moved to exit the room, glad for the excuse, when Luther placed a heavy hand on his chest, stopping him. 

“Drop it,” he demanded. 

“Ex-squeeze me?” Klaus raised his eyebrows. Luther had never been particularly observant in the past, and he doubted his brother knew specifically what he had taken. He probably made the assumption based off the ‘junkie looking for a fix’ archetype. 

“Do it. Now.”

Klaus paused, considering, and then turned and moved back to the desk. “All right, all right. It’s just an advance on our inheritance! That’s all it is!” he dropped most of the trinkets he’d collected on the floor in front of the desk, making no movement to reveal or remove the box. “No need to get your little panties in a bunch,” he taunted the brother who remained a kissass even after their old man was gone for good. Well, gone for  _ their _ good. He hadn’t tried yet and didn’t really want to, but Klaus was sure he could force the man’s spirit to appear in front of him if he pushed. He actually  _ had _ been genuinely surprised Dad  _ hadn’t _ shown up the moment he started defiling the office with his presence. He didn’t really want to test his stubbornness against the old man’s though, so his absence was somewhat of a relief. 

Klaus left Allison and Luther to their happy little reunion, hearing something about a relief that he was still the same old Klaus, and he suppressed a nasty sneer. Right. The same pushover Number Four from their childhood, relatively useless (as far as they knew), but hey, at least he hadn’t been poor, ordinary Number Seven. He mentally shook his head at how worked up he was still getting over their poor family dynamics. Frank had taught him long ago how useless family was - it’s why his mentor had disposed of his wife and children before exiting the world. Sometimes he pushed for Klaus to do the same - to take out potential opposition, the only living people in the world who had a hold over him - but Klaus continually convinced him it would draw too much attention. 

After making it a reasonable distance from every living sibling in the house, Klaus removed the shiny, expensive box from where he’d hidden it, and started working at the clasp. He paused when he heard a shuffling sound and moved into the semi-privacy of his old bedroom, locking the door behind him. He knelt on the floor and grabbed the nearest metal item - a pair of scissors - and started banging at the lock on the box, cackling with joy when it finally broke open, revealing his prize. And oh, what a prize! The exact item he was looking for. An expensive leather notebook, shiny R.H. engraved on the top. 

His hands trembled slightly as he pulled the book from the box, ignoring the sheaves of paper also enclosed within. 

“Is that…?” Ben looked stunned. 

“Dad’s old torture notebook? Why yes, yes it is,” Klaus’ grin nearly split his face in two, and it was mirrored by Frank’s mangled face which literally was split in two. “Shall we see what he has to say about us?” Klaus got more comfortable on the floor.

“This feels wrong,” Ben said slowly, as Klaus cracked open the cover. 

“Number One,” Klaus read over his brother’s goody two shoes nature, “‘Enhanced physical strength and resilience,’ blah, blah, blah, ‘excels at everything he tries,’ ‘dedication bordering on inhuman,’ - well, I’m glad even Dad was able to notice that - ‘my favorite.’ What a shocker.” 

“Klaus,” Ben said cautiously again. 

“What?” he looked up at his brother. “You want to hear what Dad had to say about you? Okay.” He flipped forwards several pages, even as Ben spat out the negative. “‘Gruesome but fascinating…’” Klaus paused, but then pushed on. Ben should hear this. “‘Easily manipulated due to enthusiastic if naive nature. Must learn to suppress my nausea to study further.’” 

Ben had started looking pale as he started, and by the end was trembling. He hadn’t even read through the experiment notes. 

“That’s what he thinks of you,  _ Number Six _ . All of us were just experiments to him! I mean, this is far from the worst he said about you! You’re not his lap dog anymore - you’re dead. Because of him. You’ve never been as bad about hero worshiping him as Luther, but he doesn’t deserve any kind of regard from you.”

“Put it away, Klaus.” 

“What? You don’t want to hear what he has to say about the rest of our siblings? How about mine?” Klaus flipped the pages. 

Ben didn’t respond, but continued glaring solemnly at him. 

“Fine!” he slammed the book shut. “There will be plenty of time for it later. It’s best to get rid of the evidence before Luther or Pogo think about what I was really doing in Dad’s office.”

He stood from the floor, levitating the book and other files into the section he had carved out of the ceiling long ago to hide his contraband. The panel slid easily back into place, and Klaus took the fancy pearl box and left the mansion. It wasn’t difficult to find a pawn shop that would accept the clearly stolen item, and while Klaus didn’t  _ need _ the cash it got him, it’d be nice not to have to use one of his credit cards around his siblings and answer the questions of how or where he got it from. (Not that he was planning to be around them for much longer - he didn’t know where that idea came from.)

To distract himself, Klaus returned to the mansion and started rifling through all of his siblings’ belongings (or at least, the belongings present in their old rooms). He stole a knife from Diego, rubbed Luther’s toothbrush in his armpit, changed into one of Allison’s skirts, rifled through Vanya’s sheet music, and grabbed one of Ben’s abandoned books. If Ben was still grumpy with him later, he could give it to him as a present (he refused to be there when Klaus went through all the rooms because it would be an ‘invasion of privacy.’ Hadn’t he learned yet?)

He got Luther’s memo shortly after touching up his makeup, and joined the rest of his surviving siblings in one of the living rooms. 

He ignored most of the conversation other than making his sarcastic comments, until Luther’s attention was focused solely on him. “Look, I know you don’t like to do it, but I need you to talk to Dad.”

Klaus rolled his eyes and scoffed at Number One. Luther knew nothing. “I can’t just call Dad in the afterlife and be like ‘Dad, could you just stop playing tennis with Hitler for a moment and take a quick call.’”

“Since when? That’s your thing!” Luther pushed again. 

Which, yeah, that  _ is _ his thing, but as far as the Academy jerks were aware, he had stopped being able to conjure the dead the moment he turned into a drug addict. They hadn’t been particularly nice to him during this reunion, Luther especially, so he didn’t see why he should let them in on a truth they wouldn’t even care to believe. Wouldn’t fit into their world view. He would stick with his initial plan - cater to their expectations and not let the truth slip. 

“I’m not in the right frame of mind.” That was actually sort of true. If he summoned Dad right now, he’d probably use too much power and really show his family a thing or two about who he had become. He had been told by several spirits that he got a certain  _ look _ when he was bending the dead to his will. Something in his expression that was chilling - he supposed that would be the general lack of care. And for all that his family had their negative opinions of him, they had never seen him as particularly powerful or dangerous, and it was still more convenient to keep it that way. At least for now. 

“You’re high?” his siblings demanded.

Good. They proved him right. Their first thoughts were about drugs, not about his emotional state or current level of control. Fuck them. “Well, sober up, this is important.” 

Klaus shakes his head at Number One. Would the esteemed team leader even believe him if he told everyone what Dad had to say? No. They would demand proof. And since they didn’t know he could make ghosts solid and audible now, as far as they were aware he wouldn’t be able to provide it. A pointless exercise in demonstrating how inferior he is to the main team again. Oh how he loved family reunions. (He was starting to wish he hadn’t come, despite how much he wanted to see the evidence of the old man finally being gone.)

“Isn’t it obvious? He thinks one of us killed Dad,” he tuned back in as Diego revealed Luther’s focus. 

He actually gaped at his brother.  _ Really? _ Luther didn’t deny it, and that just made the situation that much more interesting. He wondered where he ranked on Luther’s suspect scale. Not very high judging by how he was asked to provide more evidence, but then, maybe he had just been waiting to see what Klaus would say in response. He’d probably move up a few places if Luther knew he was capable of summoning their father but hadn’t. Klaus almost wished it  _ had _ been him. Honestly his top suspect was probably Diego. But Diego was busy the night of Dad’s actual death, so unless he had developed a new power none of them knew about (not actually all that unlikely, now that he thought about it), then it wasn’t him. (Klaus had long since acquired a network of informants in the ghosts around the city who refused to move on. It took a significant amount of his energy to restore some of their sanity and reasonability, and many of them still would only do their own things, but occasionally they turned up and gave him some good intel of what was going on in the city. The network around the mansion was his first attempt at it - his informants back in L.A. were much more reliable - but several of them approached him when he stepped back into town and gave reports like he had never left.)

The family dispersed in the wake of Luther’s motives being revealed, and Klaus went his own way. He thought about returning to his room and going through more of the book, but tensions were high right now and he didn’t want to be caught with it if someone (*cough* Luther *cough*) decided to barge in on him without knocking. He couldn’t trust Frank to be a lookout because he would want to see the contents too, and he couldn’t trust Ben as a lookout for obvious reasons, and he didn’t care enough to summon another spirit just for that role. 

With a sigh, he headed to Dad’s bar, deciding he really was too sober to deal with his family. Less than a day and he already wanted to gouge his own eyes out. Frank and Ben could forgive him for indulging one night. He passed the urn filled with Dad’s ashes on the way and scoffed at the container. Pretentious. Usually the remains would be a nice place for the spirit to hang out, but there was still no sign of Dear Dead Dad. He did pause to wonder if the man had actually managed to peacefully pass on, before dismissing the idea. Reginald Hargreeves? Leave the world without kicking and screaming and one last attempt at manipulation? Never. He was just being stubborn. 

Klaus grabbed a bottle of the good whiskey and toasted his father’s ashes. “Feel free to take your sweet time. I don’t want to talk to you anyway. The less effort I have to make and the longer it takes you the better.” He downed several glasses quickly, sure that would really piss his father off, seeing him wasting the liquor. 

Frank and Ben faded into the background, although Ben was still slightly more present. Ben had always been stubborn that way. 

Klaus faded into the pleasant buzz, pondering next steps. He had technically already done what he had come for, but things were starting to get interesting now. Had his father actually been murdered? Sure, it was a possibility. The man probably had loads more enemies if his children were anything to go by. Did he care enough to ask him directly? Absolutely not. But he did care enough to stick around and see how Luther’s ‘investigation’ went. Sure, leave the brunt force guy to do the thinking. He’d been on the moon for the past 4 years. He probably wasn’t even caught up on Earth-related drama. (Not that Klaus was either, but that was more willful ignorance than just ignorance.)

A sound kicked into the background, disturbing his peaceful moment. Luther was playing one of his records as loud as it would go. ‘I Think We’re Alone Now.’ How apt. With the alcohol in his system, he felt relaxed enough to give in to the beat - it was a catchy song, sue him - even climbing on the table as another fuck you to Dad. 

Klaus had a fraction of a moment to catch the urn of ashes that went flying at him when the music cut off. Had Dad finally manifested? As a ridiculously angry poltergeist? Several knives slammed into the wall. 

But, no, something was happening outside. He followed the others into the courtyard, staring at the temporal anomaly. (Yes, Luther was probably right the first time around.) It was kind of pretty. Reminded him a bit of the glow left behind when Five used his power. (Who was being maudlin now? This place was bringing out all sorts of emotions!) 

Of course, that was about when Five dropped out of the portal, looking exactly the same as he did when he ran away all those years ago. 

“Does anyone else see little Number Five, or is that just me?” Klaus asked, not sure if Five had made it back alive or dead. 

The consensus seemed to agree on 'alive,’ and they reconvened in the house. Klaus sat back on the table, even as the others all gathered around to watch the mystery that was Five. Five who had jumped into whatever crapshoot the future was and only cared about his own suffering but took a moment to compliment his dress… (it was only a skirt and jacket top, but hey, a compliment was a compliment). 

Klaus wished he hadn't given in to the temptation to drink earlier. He wanted Frank with him for this conversation. He could see Ben in the corner of his eye, also staring at Five, but Ben wasn't and wouldn't ever be Frank. 

Five stormed off with his sandwich, and the family all left to do their own things again. Klaus sighed, and moved back into the living room. He'd always liked how wide and open the room was. (The mausoleum had screwed up small spaces for him. Part of why he knocked down the wall between his and Vanya's rooms and took over her space the moment she was gone.) Returning to the Academy was just getting more and more complicated. Dad just so happened to die the week Five returned from the future? That seemed unlikely. But how could he have managed to die just a few days before Five returned? Five would have come back to an empty house if not for the funeral. The 'suspicious circumstances’ Luther had been spouting on and on about were looking more likely by the minute. 

If he was sober, all he would need to do was flick his fingers to get answers. If he was sober, he probably would have done it already. Of course, he still had no desire to show Dad just how much he had advanced outside of his tender love and care, but at the same time he wanted to rub his power in Dad's face. Show him how much more he had become. He wasn't one of his father's stupid heroes, destined to save the world. He was his own person, with his own life, and his own methods of using his power. Klaus sighed again, ignoring Ben's watchful gaze. He didn't have to decide yet. He wouldn't have to decide until morning. 

The clock ticked faithfully onward, and Klaus pulled himself off the couch at the agreed upon time and met the others by the door to the courtyard. The rain put a damper on things, but the pink plastic umbrella he had left by the door years ago was still there. The others all grabbed black umbrellas, with the exception of the ever-dramatic Luther and Diego. 

Klaus sniggered to himself when Luther dumped the ashes, the rain making them wet and clumped together. An inglorious ending for a vainglorious man. 

Pogo said his sweet, deferential words, which Diego couldn’t let stand. And of course, Diego insulted their father, which Luther couldn’t let stand. Most of the others attempted to break up the fight, but Klaus cheered them on. Finally, something to liven up this funeral! He wanted Diego to win, although he knew from their childhood that it would be unlikely. But Luther had been on the moon for four years, so his abilities had to have slacked some, right? Not that his bulk had decreased at all. He still couldn’t get over Luther’s freakish increase in size. 

“And there goes Ben’s statue,” Allison rolled her eyes, as Luther actually threw a punch with his full strength. 

The head rolled off, and Klaus glanced at the Ben standing next to him, and the sorrow in his eyes. He had been begging Klaus to step in and stop them up until this point. Now he just looked fatigued and depressed. 

Diego whipped out a knife, and Klaus expected things to get more interesting, but he merely winged dear Number One who immediately ran off, and everyone else left the party soon after. 

Now alone in the courtyard, Klaus approached the ugly pile of ashes, and crouched down close. “I bet you're loving this, hmm? The team at its best. It's just like old times. Best funeral ever.” He wished he had something to deface the remains with but settled for just spitting on them. Good riddance. He passed Ben’s statue as he moved to go back into the house. Served the ugly thing right - Ben had never liked it anyways. None of the others had taken him seriously when he told them that at the ceremony, however. Of course not. Don’t believe the brother who sees the dead when he tells you what the dead are saying. Typical of his entire life within this family, and another reason why Luther’s demand that he summon Dad was so damn ridiculous. 

Klaus was struck with the sudden urge to get as far away from the house as he could. To leave and never come back, like had been his original plan. Christ, he’d even gone to the other side of the country! Not entirely outside the range of his father’s influence, but far enough from his precious Academy that Klaus had been left to his own devices. The freedom to make his own choices and use his powers in the ways  _ he _ wanted was always something he would treasure. (He really shouldn’t have had those drinks earlier).

Conveniently enough, Diego had also decided to leave the house, and it wasn’t too difficult to convince him to let Klaus tag along. He didn’t have an exact destination in mind, just… away. Maybe get something to eat. Tomorrow, he would get some answers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there is the first Chapter!  
> Not significantly different from canon yet, but hey, sober Klaus keeps the notebook... that'll probably change a few things down the line... you'll have to come back for the next chapter to find out what!  
> The lines Klaus reads from the notebook came directly from the comics.  
> I haven't decided on an upload schedule yet... I'm open to suggestions though lol  
> I hope everyone is staying healthy and *at home*! I definitely don't want this isolation continuing for much longer. It's already driving me crazy.


	2. Chapter 2

**_Chapter 2_ **

The first thing to always come back after he imbibed were the voices. Screaming, crying, clawing. One might ask how a voice could claw, but Klaus most assuredly had experience in that department and was sticking with the adjective. Every time he got high or drunk it was like hitting the reset button on his control once he reached sober again. He had to build back up to being the one in charge. Rolling off the couch, Klaus glanced around the living room. Frank was back, and so were a swarm of unfamiliar spirits progressively gaining clarity. 

“Shit,” he groaned, taking stock of his condition. He was mostly naked, his clothes strewn about the room. Luckily, despite a lingering headache and some dehydration, he wasn’t suffering much of a hangover. 

“You know you talk in your sleep?” Ben stated, seeming preoccupied. He always tried to act so cool and collected when he wasn’t busy being an annoyingly preachy gnat, but Klaus saw right through him. 

“Yeah, thanks, Ben,” Klaus rolled his eyes. Like he didn’t hear that every time it happened. Not that Ben  _ or _ Frank would tell him what he’d been saying after the fact. Let them be mysterious, he didn’t care. (Okay, he was curious, but he would never give them the satisfaction of knowing that! So long as he wasn’t spilling things that could get him in trouble, he didn’t really care. And one of them would probably tell him if that was the case. Maybe.)

Klaus sat back on the couch and leaned into the cushions, looking at the mess of ghosts around the room. He knew by now that he acted as a beacon to all the dead in a particular area, but this was absolutely ridiculous. There were ghosts in every inch of open space, enough that he couldn't always distinguish individual figures. Each was screaming their individual problems or issues in a variety of languages, and it was really just a miasma of noise. He closed his eyes, blocking out all the gore and carnage in front of him, and focused on pushing away all the unfamiliar spirits. He didn’t care enough to actually help them move on to the next plane of existence, but he didn’t want them around him, so he created a barrier they couldn’t pass through (they didn’t have to go home, but they couldn’t stay here!). Isolating the whole building (an entire city block) would have been a bit excessive, so Klaus just made the barrier far enough that he couldn’t see or hear any of them (out of sight, out of mind). As always, he made a specific exception for Frank, and Ben seemed as unphased as ever by modifications to his power. (Even when he specifically tried to force Ben away, his brother didn’t budge. Jerk.)

A throat clearing startled Klaus from his focus and he quickly ensured there were no physical manifestations of his powers lingering in the room. Sometimes he floated or glowed while performing this ritual, and others he left behind a distinctive scent. It wasn’t strong this time, and he supposed it was odd enough that whoever disturbed him might mistake it for drugs if they didn’t care enough.

“Christ on a cracker! Pogo?” The chimpanzee butler did not seem to have noticed anything out of the ordinary, or at the very least didn't feel the need to comment if he had. 

“My apologies, Master Klaus. I have a query for you.”

“Oh?” Klaus questioned, standing and moving behind the couch where Ben was sitting. He'd found the book as he'd been meant to and was pretending to be engrossed in it. (Klaus could tell he was fake reading because he hadn’t turned a page the entire time Klaus had been awake, and Ben was many things, but a slow reader wasn’t one of them.) 

“Items from your father's office have gone missing. In particular, an ornate box with pearl inlay.”

“Really? You don't say?” Pogo absolutely knew what was in the box. It's the only reason he'd be concerned about the thing. 

“Any idea where it went?” 

“No, no, no. No idea. Sorry,” Klaus shrugged. 

“Liar,” Ben looked up from his book, turning around to look at him. 

Klaus rolled his eyes. “Drop dead.”

“Low blow,” Ben pursed his lips, but Klaus was unaffected. This was a regular back and forth between them. 

“Would you shut up?” 

“Excuse me?” Pogo glared at him. 

“Pogo, I didn't mean you,” Klaus waved a hand in Pogo's direction, moving away from where Ben was. It was just like his brother to try and trip him up, distract him. “I just, you know, there's been a lot of stuff I've been dealing with. Just a lot of memories coming up. All those good times. Well, not so much good times as really awful, terrible, depressing times…” 

“The contents of that box are priceless,” Pogo interjected. Yeah, he definitely knew Dad's notebook was in there. Speaking of the notebook… once he got rid of Pogo it'd be a pretty good time to go through it again. “Were they to find their way back to the office, whoever took it would be absolved of any blame or consequences,” Pogo had continued droning on in that superior tone of his. It sounded like the statement hurt him, but he said it anyway due to how badly he wanted that book back. It made Klaus even more curious as to what else was written in the thing. Must be some pretty good shit in there. 

“Oh, well, lucky bastard,” he responded. There was no way Pogo would be getting his primate paws back on Dad's stuff. 

“Indeed,” Pogo clicked his tongue at him, before finally exiting the room. 

Klaus rolled his eyes again, and then gathered up his clothes from the floor (a little telekinesis easing the way, once he was sure no one else was around to see) and went back to his room. 

Of course, he didn’t get much farther than pulling his pants back on before he was intruded on again. Five popped into his room like he owned the place (and Klaus was lucky he hadn’t waited another five or so minutes and gotten to see him either using his telekinesis or reading through Dad’s book.) 

Five treated him like an addict, offering twenty bucks to go along with his scheme. Something to do with an eyeball and getting answers, and an adult needing to be present. Klaus wasn’t all that interested, but Frank gave him an encouraging nod, so he agreed, pretending he was in it for the money instead of the curiosity. He’d have plenty of time to go through the book later. 

Five told him to put on something professional, but nothing he had would match Five’s standards anyways, so he just threw on a random shirt and had only just entered Five’s room when he was shoved into the closet, Vanya’s voice entering soon after. Of course Five had gone to Vanya first. He wasn’t insulted or surprised - she was always the one he had been closest to as a child. Well, her and Ben, and Five had no way to talk to Ben as far as he knew. He still mocked Five for it afterwards, and continued getting on Five’s nerves even through the process of rifling through Dad’s (extraordinarily boring) closet and heading to the company Five wanted answers from. 

When they pulled up in front of Meritech, Klaus had to stifle his giggles. Of course Five was trying to manipulate answers out of a company Klaus already owned. Hilarious. And to think his brother asked the one person who could get him the answers he wanted, even if his initial plan failed… Well, now Klaus felt almost obligated to help him. 

Five managed to talk their way into a meeting with the Doctor he had apparently already had contact with once before, Grant or something like that. Obviously, Five didn’t get a different answer than he did before, but that wasn’t surprising. For all that Five claimed to be an old man who was now all-knowing, he didn’t really know people all that well. He also didn’t seem inclined to learn, so Klaus supposed there was truth to the saying you couldn’t teach an old dog new tricks.

“Now, there’s nothing more I can do, so-”

“Grant, I can call you Grant, right?” Klaus finally interjected now that Five had crashed and burned. 

“It’s Lance,” the guy sounded hesitant.

“Will you do me a favor and look up the name,” Klaus started.

“I already told you, I can’t give you client information!” the guy looked annoyed now.

“Oh, no, I wasn’t talking about the client’s name! I mean the name of the owner of this company.” 

Five glanced at him, obviously confused. He definitely didn’t know where Klaus was going with this, so he wasn’t as smart as he thought he was. His little brother missed out on quite a lot while he was off living in the future. You’d think at some point Klaus would have messed up somewhere and his scheming would have come to light, but this was actually quite encouraging, knowing that he was going to continue getting away with it for decades into the future. As a reward for that certainty, and for the compliment (however slight) the night of Five’s return, he figured he could do this much for Five, since it was clearly so important to him. 

“I don’t know the name of the owner,” Grant stated. 

“That’s why I suggested you look it up. Come on, then. Who signs your paycheck?” 

Grant opened a drawer in his desk, and pulled out a file, looking at the information within. He looked between the file and Klaus a few times, while Five continued to sit in silent observation. He was clearly dubious of this line of questioning, but was letting things play out. He would be rewarded for his trust in just a few moments. 

“Go on, then, read it for the room,” Klaus smiled. 

“Klaus Hargreeves,” Grant looked slightly afraid. 

“What?” Five demanded. 

“That’s right. Now, can you go fetch us that file on the eye, Grant? Otherwise you might need to start clearing out your desk. I don’t tolerate idiots in my company. Schnell!” He wasn’t sure Grant understood German, but he definitely understood the tone of his voice. 

“Right away, sir!” Grant rushed out of the office, practically running in his efforts to follow orders. Good. Klaus just smiled, and leaned back in his chair, propping his hands behind his head. 

“What the hell was that?” Five demanded rising to his feet. He looked a bit tightly wound. He really should learn to relax more. Didn’t they have massage parlors in the future? Sure, Five had claimed it was shit, but Klaus really couldn’t imagine a future absent of massages. He’d summon and materialize a ghost for it, if he had to.

“That was me getting the eye’s information for you, as requested. You’re welcome,” Klaus gave a mock yawn. 

“How are you listed as the owner of the company?” Five stood, placing himself directly in front of Klaus’ line of sight. 

“It’s been that way ever since I gained the controlling share,” Klaus smiled charmingly at him. “Aren’t you glad you asked for my help?” 

Any further questions were postponed by Grant’s re-entrance. He sat back at his desk and opened the file, and Five moved to read over his shoulder instead. Grant trembled a little as he looked at Klaus again, and he gave the man an encouraging smile. “Oh, that’s strange.”

“What?” Five demanded. 

“Uh, the eye. It hasn’t been purchased by a client yet.” 

“What? What do you mean?” Klaus questioned, standing from his own chair and moving behind Grant, leaning against and over his shoulder. The man was visibly uncomfortable with Klaus’ closeness, which really just made the situation that much more amusing for him.

“Well, uh, our logs say the eye with that serial number - this can’t be right. It hasn’t even been manufactured yet. Where did you get that eye?”

Five grimaced, shaking his head, obviously already accepting some form of defeat. 

“Now wait just a moment there, Grant,” Klaus pulled back, moving across from him again.    
“Lance,” he interjected again. 

Klaus waved a hand in his direction. “Your name isn’t what’s important here, your side business is.”

“What?” both Lance and Five questioned. 

“Does the name Margaret mean anything to you? Since you’re so fond of names, and all.” (Okay, so Klaus wasn’t great with names. But really, who could blame him? He met and interacted with so many more people than the typical person. He couldn’t be expected to memorize every name that was ever given to him, could he? He only remembered the important ones.)

“I-I don’t know any Margarets,” the doctor still looked confused. 

“How about Michael? Florence? Sarah? What, you don’t know any of them?” Klaus shook his head in disappointment. “Well they certainly found out who you were, Mr. Big. After all, it isn’t every day that someone makes a fraudulent charge to an insurance company using your patient information which drives you so deep into debt you just die. Well, their actual deaths had various causes, not important, but they all led right back to you and your black market side business.” 

“How do you know about that?” Lance looked terrified. Five also looked like he really wanted to know the answer to that. The answer, naturally, was from the ghosts who had been crowding the room and whining at him since they first arrived at the building. Why neither of them went for that clear answer was beyond him. Lance here was small potatoes, so normally he wouldn’t even bother acknowledging these ghosts. The things he did for his siblings. 

“Oh Grant, Grant, Grant. Don’t you recognize my name? Anything? The dead speak to me, and they have quite a lot to say about you. Now why don’t you open up that hidden safe of yours, and check your records again.” 

“Are you going to report me?” Lance asked, shaking in his seat. Klaus noted that he didn’t correct him about his name again. 

“Oh, please. You’re not worth my time, even if they think haunting you is worth theirs. Just get us our information, Grant. One chance, that’s all you’ve got.” 

The safe was unlocked within seconds, and a list was shoved into his hands, which Five quickly snatched. It only took a few moments for him to shove it away with disgust. “It isn’t here, either.” He then stormed out of the office, and Lance and Klaus both watched him go for a moment. 

“Well, that will conclude our business for today. Thanks for your cooperation. Don’t even think about telling anyone about this, and don’t forget, Lance, I have eyes everywhere. I’ll be in touch.” With those parting words, Klaus followed after Five, catching up to him out front of the company. It’d be kind of hypocritical of him to fire Lance for his less-than-legal side business when Klaus himself had obtained Meritech through less-than-legal means. He was almost done with the company, although if he could make more of a profit off black market sales before running it into the ground… well, now he knew that was an option, and he even had an easy contact for it. Anything that was less work on his part with more profit was good in his books (and his accountant and lawyers agreed with him). 

“Well, this is not good,” Five grouched. 

“I was pretty good, though, right? You wouldn’t have gotten this far without me!” Klaus preened. It wasn’t often he genuinely helped someone, especially not family. 

“Klaus, it doesn’t matter!” 

Doesn’t matter? It’s not like Klaus showed more of himself to his little - well, older - brother than any of their other siblings! It’s not like he revealed at least some of his power! Even Ben had actually approved of this venture - Klaus doing something to help one of his siblings, ungrateful little brat that he is. 

“What? What’s the big deal with this eye, anyway?” he demanded, plopping himself down onto the concrete. Not the most comfortable seat he’s ever had, but also far from the least. 

“There is someone out there who’s going to lose an eye in the next seven days. They’re going to bring about the end of life on this Earth as we know it.” 

Wait, what? 

“Wait, what? Life as we know it as in, like, a revolution or something? A dictator? Taking over, changing laws?” 

“The apocalypse is coming,” Five responded, turning his back. 

And okay, what? Five had said the future was shit, but he didn’t say there had been a literal apocalypse, and Klaus kind of felt like that was something really big to leave out. There was a massive difference between Five not discovering his money making machinations because Klaus was doing an awesome job at keeping it secret, and Five not finding out because literally all records of everything had been destroyed. 

“ _ The apocalypse? _ You’re going to have to be a little more specific!” 

Five let out a derisive snort. “You’re useless. You’re all useless!”

Hurtful. He hadn’t even shared the whole story yet, how were any of them supposed to be helping? Five apparently ‘knew everything’ (except the identity of the owner of his stupid eyeball), but didn’t know that you can’t really help someone unless you have all the facts? Klaus had just proved to his brother that he was more than what meets the eye (he internally laughed at the secret pun), but he dismissed that in favor of throwing a tantrum. He really was at risk of moving down a level on his list of favorite siblings. (Hah, just kidding. The others all sucked enough that Five was in the lead just for not existing to bug him for over a decade). 

“Oh, come on. You need to lighten up, old man. Hey, you know, I’ve just now realized why you’re so uptight. You must be horny as hell!” he cackled, just imagining his apparently 58-year-old brother, alone in the apocalypse. He must be very familiar with his right hand. “All those years by yourself. It’s gotta screw with your head, being alone.”

Five sighed, then sat on the pavement next to him. 

“Well, I wasn’t alone.” 

Finally! Five  _ had _ to have found Klaus eventually, right? Klaus knew well enough that whatever broke the world couldn’t have killed him. Nothing could kill him. (Or at the very least, make him stay dead.) He wasn’t sure Five had known about his apparent-immortality (or really just his special ability to piss God off), but this must be where he shares, right? 

“Oh, pray tell?”

“Her name was Delores,” Five gazed off into the distance, unaware or uncaring of the shift in Klaus’ expression. 

WHAT. 

“We were together for over thirty years.”

Thirty years, and he never once ran into Klaus? Impossible. “Thirty years? Oh, wow! The longest I’ve been with someone is three weeks. Although it was really just because of his cooking. He made the most fantastic osso bucco… It was-” Without another word, Five used his power to disappear. Right. Guess brotherly bonding was over. Asshole. He shook his head in disappointment. He needed more information, and Five obviously wasn’t going to give it to him. 

“Don’t you think it’s time to summon Dad?” Ben asked, moving into his field of vision. 

“It’s suspicious that his death falls so close to Five’s return and tidings of doom,” Frank agreed. 

The two looked at each other in disgust, even as Klaus cackled. “You two are agreeing with each other for once? I guess miracles really can happen! I ought to tell God next time I see Them.” They gave him mirror scowls, and he laughed again. “Alright. Let’s go somewhere a bit more comfortable for this.”

Five had been his transportation to the lab in the first place and he’d already disappeared, so Klaus wandered for a bit before managing to catch a cab. He wasn’t putting this off at all, no way. Of course not. It just took some time to find a taxi in this part of the city! And, you know, he didn’t correct the cab driver when he started taking the long way to the Academy, because it’s not like he needed to be thrifty!

He tipped the driver more than was necessary for being so polite about ignoring his conversation with Frank and Ben, and finally let himself into the mansion. 

He hovered in the entryway for a moment, ignoring both questions shot his way, and then strode into the kitchen instead. “Look, I can’t summon on an empty stomach, now can I? It just wouldn’t be right. And it might be difficult. I’ll need my energy. I better eat something first. I haven’t eaten in ages!” 

He ignored how much that sounded like an excuse, even to his ears. Upon finding the kitchen empty, he then had to hunt around for Mom - it wouldn’t do to enter her domain, after all. It was literally her job to cook and provide for them. He couldn’t take that from her. 

It took time to find her, and time to eat, and by the time he finished, he was feeling kind of sleepy. 

“I’ll just do it tomorrow. What’s the rush? I need a nap.” 

Frank shot him the equivalent of a knowing smirk, even as Ben yammered on about irresponsibility and yadda yadda yadda, right up until Klaus finally reached his room and put his headphones on to drown out the noise. 

Right. A nap. That’s exactly what he needed. And yes, he did  _ need _ it, he absolutely was not delaying the inevitable! No siree, no delaying here! Just a sleepy medium!

He ignored the fact that it took him a long time to fall asleep, and instead surrendered to it once he was finally able.

* * *

Klaus managed to sleep through the whole night before his chosen procrastination method failed him. In the light of morning, he could no longer continue putting this off. He needed to summon Dad. He didn’t want to do this in his own room, because that would be gross (his father in his private space - no thank you!), and he didn’t want to do it near where any of the others would walk in… but as Five had said only, what, two days ago? This house had forty-two bedrooms, even if less than ten of them had ever been used. He walked to the room farthest from the main hub of the Academy and sat down on the bed, on top of the dust cover. 

“Right. Summoning Dad. Because surprise of all surprises, I actually want to talk to the bastard for once,” he muttered out loud. He shoved himself into the center of the bed, then crossed his legs and closed his eyes. Sometimes it was really easy to call a specific spirit forth, and it barely took a nudge of his power to bring them in front of him. Other times it was like nails on a chalkboard, like walking a tightrope, like ripping out his own fingernails (and he had a personal experience to support that last one). Of course his father could never do things by the halves, and he really was a fingernails kind of guy. He strained against the barrier between life and death (because yes, the bastard really had moved on instead of lingering). He was forced to use the same facet of power that usually had him forcing spirits past the barrier to rip his father through it in the opposite direction. It wasn’t something he had needed to do before, and by the time he succeeded, the abandoned room smelled strongly of that otherworldly ozone scent. 

Klaus pushed past the fatigue and opened his eyes, meeting those of his father. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there was Chapter 2! Still setting the scene slightly, and 3 will also be building up. Chapter 4 is the one I'm most excited to post. You'll find out why soon enough!   
> (As a hint - it was part of the original idea I had when starting this series...everything else has kind of been building up to a big scene in 4). 
> 
> Thanks for reading!!


	3. Chapter 3

**_Chapter 3_ **

Sir Reginald Hargreeves, Klaus’ esteemed father, immediately scowled at the sight of his least favorite son. “What in God’s name took you so long? I expected my son who can conjure the dead to have brought me forth ages ago.” The ghost of the man perfectly mirrored his memories of the abusive asshole. Stiff spine, pressed suit, monocle firmly lodged on his face… The only difference was in addition to the scowl, there was a tightness to his features he’d never seen before, as though he was thoroughly uncomfortable. Good. Hopefully the experience of being summoned was just as horrible as what Klaus had gone through to get him here. 

Klaus scowled right back. “Oh, yeah, well, you see, it’s complicated.” He put as much venom into his tone as he could without fully crossing into darker territory. 

“You were poisoning yourself,” Daddy Hargreeves grouched at him. 

Klaus couldn’t believe there was ever a time he’d been scared of this man. This monster. This asshole who locked a child in with his worst fears just for not being the perfect little soldier. He prepared to shout all his father’s failings, including his utterly incorrect observations, but then just shook his head. There was no point. Not yet, at least. “Well, what did you expect? You’d just died. I was beside myself with grief.” The sarcastic tone to his voice was plain for any to see, but of course, his father chose to ignore it. 

“Don’t you dare try to use me as an excuse for your weakness,” his father scowled imperiously. This  _ shade _ of the man didn’t quite manage the full effect however, and Klaus refused to be cowed by him when for once, Klaus had all the power. 

“Oh, right, well, yeah. You had nothing to do with it,” Klaus shook his head, not even bothering to touch on the abuse he’d suffered. His father had never seen it as abuse before, and that wasn’t about to change just because the man was dead. It would be pointless and a waste of breath, and it would fall on -hah- dead ears. 

Father shook his head and looked down his nose at him. “You children like to blame everything on me.” 

He couldn’t even own up to his faults in death. “Well, you were a sadistic prick. Not to mention the world’s worst father.” And truly unobservant. He’d focused his full attention on Klaus the moment he’d appeared, and didn’t even look at his surroundings. Ben and Frank were both out of his direct line of sight, but witness to the entire conversation. In life, Ben had been a sycophant just like his other siblings, looking out for himself even as he tried to seem ‘nice.’ In death he still held his superiority over Klaus, disagreeing with his life decisions even as he learned more about what Klaus had gone through, what had made him into who he was. Klaus truly believed the only reason Ben stuck by his side was because he was the only person alive who could see him, and most of the other ghosts were insane and not good company at all (Frank as the obvious exception). Frank had never been impressed by his father, and he was the one who had opened his eyes to the man’s faults in the first place. He was the reason Klaus didn’t wind up like the rest of his siblings. 

“I just wanted you to live up to your potential,” the man in question had continued speaking. “You especially. You’re my greatest disappointment, Number Four. You only scratched the surface of what you were truly capable of, if only you’d focused. Instead, you pump yourself full of poison because you’re afraid.” 

This is where Klaus smirked. Enough was enough. “You know, I suggest you get down off your high horse there, dear Papa. You never had our best interests at heart. And for all your superiority complex, your favoritism and your  _ lessons _ ,  _ you _ were the one who never learned.” With a casual flick of his right hand, all the furniture and detritus in the room raised into the air, and all except the bed he was still sitting on began to circle them. “I didn’t need you to unlock my full potential, I had a much better teacher than you could ever be.” At this point, telekinesis was easy. He didn’t have to focus to maintain it. At one point, he had been weak enough that he couldn’t use his other powers simultaneously, and now it was second nature. But he didn’t need to worry about intimidation this time. He wasn’t threatening or blackmailing someone, he was speaking to one of the dead, so none of that mattered. Everything dropped into its previous location, and Klaus instead focused on his father’s ghost. For the first time in his life, he was the one truly in control. “Now, tell me  _ everything _ .” He added an inescapable compulsion to the words, one he regularly used with great effect when gathering blackmail material. 

“I - what - what are you doing?” His father visibly struggled, his infamous composure faltering to the man’s obvious discontent. 

“Tell me. Why?” Klaus demanded, applying more leverage. His father was strong, he was pushing against Klaus’ power, but death was  _ Klaus _ ’, and it had been since he was born. He didn’t specify what he was asking about, as he found that often gave better information than specific questions. Open-ended questions generally meant he’d be supplied with whatever the spirit in question believed he was after. It provided him with the things they often hoped to keep quiet, or at the very least, reveal on their own terms. 

“Everything I did, everything I put you through, it was to prepare you, all of you, for something bigger than yourselves,” the words dragged themselves out of his father’s mouth, and he did not look happy about it. 

“We were just kids,” Klaus frowned. 

“You were never just kids,” the words came faster now. “You were meant to save the world.”

“Wait, wait - so you knew? You knew all about what Five has been going on about? The apocalypse?” Klaus could feel the disbelief on his face. 

“I knew that I had to bring you all back together, one way or another. The fate of the world depended on it.” 

“Wh-what? What are you saying?” It sounded like a non sequitur, but his father never wasted words like that. 

“The only way to get you all back together was something momentous,” the words came out stiffly, yet matter of fact. 

“Wait - you, no… You don’t mean you killed yourself?” he demanded. The silence was answer enough, and Klaus cackled. “Oh, Christ, you could never do things the easy way, could you?” His father looked surprised at the reaction, but still steadfast in his plan. “You couldn’t have picked up a phone?” 

“Would you have answered? Now listen to me, Number Four. What I’m about to say is of great importance -” Klaus waved his hand, and his father’s voice cut off. 

“No,  _ you _ listen. You made a few miscalculations. Or at the very least, you failed quite spectacularly in your observations. Just because I didn’t follow your schemes, wasn’t the perfect little soldier like your dear Number One, it doesn’t mean I didn’t learn how to use my powers.  _ Clearly _ . That’s your problem, Dad. You never could see past yourself. Your way or the highway. We were always just tools to you, and you never knew what to do when we didn’t react like you wanted. Because locking a child in a mausoleum will help with the fear of the dead? Because taunting a prideful brat will make him fall in line? Because forcing Ben to use something he told us was called ‘The Horror’ would make him less afraid of it? No. You’re a fool, you’ve always been a fool, and now your idiocy has ended with you dead, and me having power over you for once. What, did you think you’d make contact with me and I’d just pull you back to the world of the living? That it would be temporary? I do have the control to return some form of corporeality to the dead now, but I would never waste it on you. Now, why don’t you tell me the top three things you did your best to hide from us, and then I’ll banish you back to where you came from.”

Like before, there was some difficulty in applying his power to his father, but it was still easy enough to push past the barrier. (Okay, he was lying to himself a little. It was really difficult. More so than with any other spirit he had pushed this way. But this was also the man who had abused him his whole life, so he felt justified in the fib.) “I - am not from Earth. I sent Number One to the moon not to keep watch, but to occupy his attention and keep him away from me. I never even opened his letters. And -” he cut himself off, and struggled for several moments before finally continuing, “I had Number Three rumor Number Seven and everyone else into believing she was ordinary.”

Klaus’ eyes widened, but he followed the promise he had made to himself and pushed his father back through the veil and into the afterlife before he even had time to splutter out more protests. He didn’t even care about the extra strength it took to fully dismiss him - no way was he going to have his father wandering around again. He didn’t even want to  _ chance _ accidentally running into him. With that done, Klaus leaned back, pondering what he had learned. Dad was an alien? Vanya had powers? He was less surprised about the Luther revelation, massive tool that he was (he kind of felt like that truth had been thrown in there in an attempt to prevent the Vanya one from coming out, not that it had worked), but the other two secrets? Hmm. He was  _ almost _ tempted to ask his father more questions, but he didn’t want to deal with the man face to face again. Other than the alien thing, he was sure there was information in his father’s notes which would be more helpful than another pissing contest anyways. 

“Vanya has powers?” Ben yelped, finally speaking up. 

Klaus fixed him with a look. “You’re more surprised about that, than about Dad being an alien? Come on Ben. Seven kids born on the same day in the same suspicious circumstances and one of them randomly doesn’t have powers? Seems unlikely to me.”

Now that he knew it was there, he could feel the sticky sensation of Allison's rumor coloring all his childhood memories of Vanya. He wondered if knowing those memories were lies would make a difference… He  _ pressed _ at that barrier just as he had the barrier between life and death, levering his willpower against whatever it was Allison’s power ran on, and was surprised when he fell through it. He remembered shattered glass, and soundproofed rooms, and dead nannies… No wonder his father had eventually created Grace. You could only cover up so many deaths before people started getting suspicious about that unfillable position in the Hargreeves mansion. But then, money really did fix everything, and it’s not like their family hadn’t come under scrutiny under multiple occasions and didn’t get away scott free. Seems their family had a knack for that. (Now the silently screaming nanny ghosts made sense - of course he couldn’t hear them, they had probably been yelling about wanting revenge on Vanya.)

Klaus reclined fully back on the bed, suddenly feeling the weight of how much he had used his powers today. His father being an alien - that was probably why his ghost was so much harder to manipulate than what he was used to. It felt like he had been wrestling an uncooperative hoard as opposed to the single spirit. Not to mention dragging him through from the beyond - there’d never been a reason to try before, and like every other time he used a new facet of his power, it took so much more of his strength. Fighting what Allison did to him had been the final straw, and he felt kind of dizzy. 

Both his ghostly stalkers took note of his state. 

“Found a new limit, then?” Frank questioned. 

Klaus shrugged as best he could as he rested his eyes for a moment. “Aliens,” he snorted. Does that count as a second new facet of his power? Could he summon ghosts from other planets too? Did he have to be aware of the specific planet in question? Could he find some ghosts from planets far superior to Earth and use their knowledge for his own benefit? Did he really want Earth to have more ghosts than it already did? Questions probably best answered when there was no longer less than a week until the world ended. (At least he wouldn’t have to worry about a language barrier if he did decide to summon some - as part of his power, Klaus had always been able to understand the dead, regardless of what language they spoke.)

“-aus? Klaus?” He heard his name being called, extremely muffled but getting closer all the time. He let out a groan. Stupid Number One. 

He again experienced the impulse to leave and not bother looking back, but that wouldn’t solve this apparent apocalypse issue, and even if he  _ had _ survived it and somehow managed to never bump into Five, he didn’t really like the thought of living in a destroyed world for the rest of time. He enjoyed his luxuries. And unfortunately, the Academy was the best place to be if he was going to contribute anything or even just keep an eye on the situation. 

He left the room, and meandered his way back to the main house, encountering Luther rather quickly. He was again taken by just how huge his brother had become. He briefly wondered if that was part of why their father had sent him away, before ultimately deciding he didn’t care.

“Finally. Do you know where Five is?”

“Is that really all you’ve been yelling at me for? No, I don’t know where Five is,” Klaus rolled his eyes. Of course. 

“Well we need to find him. This is important. We need a family meeting.”

“A family meeting? Wow, am I invited? Nice to know I come second to Five,” Klaus turned away, and stumbled slightly, still dizzy from earlier. 

“Are you still high?” Luther’s tone was stuffed chock full of that smug superiority he favored (just like Dad). “Of course you are. Look, do you know where Five might be?”

“He’s probably back at Meritech again. He did seem rather fixated on it,” Klaus shrugged, walking away from Luther and towards the sitting room. 

“Meritech?” Luther questioned.

Klaus rolled his eyes. “The prosthetics company. Let me know when this ‘meeting,’” he put the word in air quotes, “is going to be.” He threw himself onto the couch, and made it clear he wasn’t going to respond further, and eventually listened as Luther pounded away. Good. 

“Looks like we have the house to ourselves, boys,” Klaus waited until he heard the front door slam before he spoke. 

“It’s absent of your siblings, at least,” Frank shrugged. 

Yeah, Pogo and Mom were still home, but neither would enter his room without knocking, unlike his siblings. 

There was no better time to see what his father wrote about Vanya. (He cared less about the notes on himself, now that he knew his father really was so blind as to buy into the addict persona.)

It was a short walk to his room, and Klaus not only locked the door behind him, but also shoved a chair underneath the handle. Just in case. 

The notebook turned out to be a treasure trove of information, and Klaus stayed fully engrossed right up until the sounds of fighting told him his siblings had returned. 

If he had not already thought his father was a psychopath, the notebook would have cinched it. Vanya had apparently been a cocky little brat, right up until she went on the pills. She had known she was more powerful than the rest of them, and their father had known it too. She was uncooperative in training and threw temper tantrums pretty regularly, about anything and everything. All the dead nannies were just from them trying to get her to eat breakfast. And then, at the tender age of four years old, she’d scared Daddy Hargreeves enough that he thought she was a lost cause. If she wouldn’t listen to him, wouldn’t follow his rules, then she wouldn't have her powers. He’d used Mom (who had still been only Grace at the time) and Pogo to confine her, and Allison to rumor her. Because that wasn’t enough, he not only drugged her with a mind-boggling and dangerous mix of depressants, anti-psychotics, and mood altering medications, but also resorted to psychological abuse and manipulation to keep her from questioning her position. All the restrictions, the isolation, the emphasis on how she would never be special - it had all been intended to break her spirit and keep her from questioning. And it had worked, for the most part. Vanya had grown into an extremely meek adult. The only exception to that was her book. And suddenly, his opinion of the book skyrocketed. The fact that she had even thought to publish something like that was astounding, and the fact she managed to go through with it? He wished he’d been able to see his father’s face when he heard about it.

With his curiosity about Vanya sated, he flicked through some more of the book, only stopping when the fighting grew loud enough he could no longer ignore it.

He wasn’t amused to be disturbed, but he dutifully put the book back in its hiding spot and moved into the living room where all of the others were congregated. 

In the fight about whether Mom killed Dad, he just stood in the background and laughed. They were right that there had to be a fault in her programming, but wrong about what it was. In order for their father to successfully commit suicide, he would have had to alter her programming enough that she wouldn’t be able to do anything to stop him. Obviously he hadn’t been the most careful about it, presumably thinking he’d be able to magically find his way back relatively quickly. It’s a wonder the man had even managed to pass through the veil in the first place, with all he had planned. 

In the end, he voted against Luther solely because Number One pissed him off. (Diego had too, with the stoner boy comment, but there was no way to match how obnoxious Luther had been to him since they all returned to the Academy.) He couldn’t care less about the robo nanny, and if she was as important and as much of a person as they all claimed, then Pogo should have been able to fix her if nothing else. The primate hadn’t even offered to try. No, he was still playing out the role their father dictated, just as he always had. (There were notes on Pogo, too. Just another of the Hargreeves Experiments. He even had a number as well, although his was from the number of tries it took to give a chimpanzee advanced intelligence. The answer? Quite a few.)

The combination of speaking with his father and the ensuing family drama left him feeling dirty, so he left the family meeting without imparting on his siblings the actual cause of their father’s death, and made his way to the bathroom. He could do with a nice bath. 

Frank left while he was getting it ready, and didn’t come back until he’d already been submerged for awhile. When he finally did return, he seemed as annoyed as Klaus was by the fact that Ben was  _ still _ nattering on about telling the others what he knew. He suggested Klaus play one of his cassette tapes to escape from the noise, and Klaus agreed, glad he had thought to bring it into the bathroom with him. It was a simple matter to put his headphones on and turn the volume up loud enough that he wouldn’t be able to hear Ben, even if his brother was yelling right in his ear. 

He took his time in the bath, waiting until the water was nearly frigid before he finally exited. 

He didn’t hear the gunshots. 

He didn’t hear the fighting. 

He didn’t see Frank, one hand over Ben’s mouth, the other restraining him from moving. 

He didn’t see the assassin come up behind him and inject him with a sedative. 

With the combination of the drug and his fatigue from overusing his powers earlier, he was unconscious within moments. 

The next time he opened his eyes, he was bound in a trunk, powers still inactive, and staring at two assassins in ridiculous children’s masks. Behind his gag, he screamed in anger and frustration.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is slightly shorter (sorry), but I promise the 4th one will definitely make up for it.   
> I hope the scene with Reginald meets expectations. The secret of him being an alien is again, taken straight from the comics. Not sure if they'll actually use it in the show, although they did have that ambiguous scene with all the rockets, so... I don't know. I'm using it though.   
> Hope you enjoyed! The next chapter will be up in a few days.


	4. Chapter 4

**_Chapter 4_ **

Waking up without powers was an extremely rare occurrence for Klaus. He rarely imbibed in the first place, and never enough that the high lasted past the time it took to sleep off whatever substance he used. Whatever relief the drugs provided never outweighed the frustration of being powerless and alone. That’s why the lack of powers is what first gave away his circumstances, rather than the dark, cramped compartment of the trunk. 

Somehow, someone had gotten the jump on him - in the mansion no less. Honestly, he had no clue who he could piss off so badly that it’d warrant an attack on the Academy and the risk of encountering his siblings. Yeah, he screwed over a bunch of rich guys and occasionally got hits put out on him, but he hadn’t done any of that here, too caught up in the family drama. 

He struggled to get out of the rope and gag, but it was fruitless. Whoever had grabbed him had definitely known what they were doing. (Maybe a little too well, since they’d known to drug him as well. Beyond his family, there weren’t many people out there who knew the connection between drugs and rendering him helpless.)

After a length of waiting and fruitless struggling, finally (finally!), the trunk was opened. He stared into two ridiculous children’s masks, and vented his anger and frustration behind the gag. He didn’t know who these clowns were, or who hired them, but he wasn’t going to make their job easy. They lifted him out of the trunk, and clearly intended to make him walk to where they wanted, but he went boneless instead. He knew from experience that would be more frustrating for them than struggling. And frustrating it was - the now named Hazel and Cha-Cha proceeded to fight over how to get him into their motel room. These two clearly knew each other well. They must have been partners for a long time. All three of them knew that Klaus would wind up in the room regardless, it was just a matter of who was going to put the most effort in. That wound up being Blue Mask, who he was pretty sure was called Hazel. He was thrown over the man’s shoulder (and damn he was strong… he might have to start thinking of this one as Mini-Luther), but it was the other one who forced him into a chair where he was quickly secured. They were extremely efficient, and proficient - again emphasizing that they were experts. He wondered who on his list of enemies had managed to afford them even after his extortion act. Honestly he was impressed. And looking forward to getting their employer’s name out of them. 

“Tell us where Five is,” the woman demanded, harshly removing the gag. 

“Five?” He demanded, recoiling more from the surprise than the pain. “That’s what this is about?”

“Number Five, where is he?” she demanded again, throwing a punch. 

She telegraphed her move, and he was able to lean back with the hit, minimizing the damage. 

“I don’t know where the little bastard is! Is that really what this is about?” It was one thing getting taken and tortured because of things he’d done, but for his stupid brother who had only just barely come back into his life? Fucking ridiculous. 

“Hey, she asked you a question,” Mini-Luther stated, tossing his own punch. 

“I told you already, I don’t know! Really, I don’t. If I did, I’d probably tell you, just for the fun of it, but the old man didn’t say where he was going.”

If Ben were here, he’d be ranting angrily at the truth in that statement, but whatever they gave him must have been extraordinarily strong - there was no hint of that brother either, and usually drugs didn’t affect him as severely. 

Like most interrogators wouldn’t, they did not accept that answer. Obviously he had to know where Five was, they lived in the same house, they’d seen the portrait, won’t he just spare himself the pain and let them know what they wanted?

It was all variations of stuff he’d heard before, although usually the subject in question was himself, and the information they wanted regarded blackmail, but torture was torture. 

Luckily Klaus was into some pretty kinky shit, and had a very active imagination. All he had to do was wait out the drug for his powers to come back. Treating all this like a BDSM scene minus the safe words wasn’t too difficult. 

Of course, they must have had some fancy designer drugs, because hours and hours passed with no change to his powers. But these psychos seemed to have tracked Five through time (and wasn’t that a thought - how on Earth had they managed that?), so they probably had access to some really good stuff. Hopefully they wouldn’t think to redose him. 

He wasn’t sure exactly how much time had passed (it had to be nearly twelve hours now), but after managing to spring a boner to asphyxiation, they backed off, frustrated and defeated. 

Klaus couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled from his mouth, even as he shook off the dizziness from the lack of air. 

“What is so funny, you asshole?” the man questioned, smacking him.

_ Klaus _ was the asshole? Right. “Well, for one… you spent the last ten hours beating me senseless, and you’ve learned absolutely nothing.” Which was pretty amusing. These guys were definitely well trained in the art of torture - he was just glad they hadn’t resorted to yanking teeth yet… those were one permanent thing that wouldn't be repaired by dying (he only ever managed to come back with fatal wounds as nearly-fatal wounds, no other healing to speak of) - and yet Klaus was utterly confounding them. Didn’t say much for the standard of their usual victim. The longer this had gone on, the more time it gave Klaus to think, and he was pretty sure Five would still be on the apocalypse eyeball thing. Just because the eye hadn’t been purchased yet didn’t mean it wouldn’t be soon. He wouldn’t put it past the little psychopath to stake out the office, just in case (although Luther had never mentioned whether he’d found him at Meritech or not, when he went off on his little search). What he hoped to find without Klaus there to access the records for him, he didn’t know. Luckily for Five, Klaus now had a vested interest in returning the favor to these assholes who were torturing him. Ten hours, they had as good as confirmed the time frame for him. It couldn’t be much longer before his powers returned, and when they did, he’d rip these two a new one. He could respect their work ethic, but that wouldn’t prevent him from making their end rather messy. 

After a pathetic attempt at waterboarding (really, they didn’t even make an effort to ensure he couldn’t breathe), they retreated to regroup. He took that moment to take stock of his situation. While he was bruised in many places, and still sluggishly bleeding from several others, the assassins really hadn’t done any permanent damage. No maiming, no missing teeth… he probably wouldn’t even have scars, or at least not bad ones. But then, their ultimate goal was information, not permanently disabling him. If they got frustrated enough with him, they might move on to more extreme measures. They also were in a motel which wasn’t the best place for that sort of torture and the screams which result from it. Even in a dump like this, people would probably take note of that. Either way, he needed to continue to buy time until the drugs wore off. Nothing they had done had loosened the bonds enough that he could get himself free without assistance, and even if he could, there was no way he’d be able to overpower both of them in his current state. 

Thing One and Thing Two returned, and resumed with new vigor, which slowly wore down as Klaus once again turned them into a joke. They had clearly never come up against someone like him before.

Finally, he heard a new voice in the room, one which hadn’t been there previously, muttering in Russian. He was surprised the first ghost to return hadn’t been Ben, but maybe Ben was just avoiding him right now? Torture never did agree with him… But he still usually stuck around despite it, out of some misplaced nobility or some such tripe. Whatever. Klaus didn’t care enough to question it right now. The dead babushka meant the drug was finally weakening. Not enough, considering there was only one ghost in the room with him as opposed to the flood he expected to be following these assassins around, but it was still the sign he’d been waiting for. 

He pretended to break down, tears spilling from his eyes as he sobbed and whimpered. He wanted them out of the motel while his strength came back to him. With any luck, he’d be fully back when they returned, and able to show them a thing or two about what a freak he was. The true question was what to give them to get them to leave. He didn’t know for certain where his brother was, and he also didn’t want them to directly encounter him. If they found Five first, Five would probably manage to kill them (the hoard of dead dogging his steps was honestly quite impressive), and that would steal the opportunity from Klaus. But he also had to give them something they’d buy, so… Ultimately there was only one real answer to give them. He wasn’t quite done with Meritech yet, but losing one building wouldn’t destroy the whole company. And anyone who spent any length of time with Five had to know of his obsession with that stupid eyeball. Maybe giving them Meritech would throw a wrench in Five’s plans, but Klaus didn’t really care about that. 

They stuffed him in the closet while they were gone, and while a maid let herself in during that time, the stupid woman either didn’t hear him behind the gag, or didn’t care. The assassins were gone for hours, and in that time, he got information not only from the babushka, Zoya Popova apparently, but also a variety of their other kills (it was more difficult without the ability to ask questions, but the dead loved talking about how they died and who was involved. There wasn't much directing necessary). Hazel and Cha-Cha definitely lived for variety, he’d give them that… Exsanguination through wrist stumps, electric shock through the nipples, drowning in jello? If these guys hadn’t spent so much time torturing him, he might try to be their friend. He was sure they had quite a few stories he’d enjoy. 

They returned before his telekinesis did, unfortunately, and apparently set a trap for his brother. He wondered if the van they left the message on actually belonged to Five, or if they just assumed that it did out of convenience. It didn’t matter too much, but it’d ruin his plans if Five found them too early. But, nearing almost 24 hours since they first had taken him, it couldn’t be too much longer. 

That’s probably why he started taunting them. He knew it wouldn’t be too much longer, and these two had clearly never faced the consequences of their actions. And why should they? Time traveling assassins? They never had to worry about being caught, or the aftermath of what they had done. All their ghosts… There were so many different time periods, different countries represented among their victims. And they had clearly never expected to hear some of their names again. Get a job, move on, that’s what they were all about. 

It turned out Mini-Luther had a bit more of a soft spot than the woman did, though. He wondered if she knew how many witnesses he had spared. He assumed not, considering it was widely agreed that she was the more ruthless of the duo. 

Jan Mueller’s story got the exact reaction he was looking for, and he gave himself a mental pat on the back, even as they retreated to the bathroom to argue. 

While the feeling had long since left his hands, he didn’t need sensation to use telekinesis, and as with the dead, he felt that begin to return as well. It wasn’t strong enough to kill his captors yet, but it was enough to loosen the ropes restraining him. Long since trained at the removal of ropes and bindings unaided, all he really needed to do to get loose was make the knots go from perfect to less-than. His first attempt at standing had him sitting back down almost immediately, pins and needles flooding his legs and body. He did his best to quietly shake them out, but he’d been restrained to this chair for almost a full day, and his body figured this was the best time to complain. Entirely unhelpful. 

Luckily the assassins were extremely wrapped up in their own conversation, and didn’t seem likely to return for the moment. Klaus massaged his aching joints, and gave another attempt at standing, managing a few steps before collapsing to the floor to the side of the left bed. Face to face with the vent, Klaus froze for a moment, listening to see if he’d been heard. A moment later he learned that he was, just not by his captors. The door clicked open, and Klaus looked up to see a cop with a gun. Considering he was on the floor, covered in blood, and still dressed in nothing but a now-stained towel, he was dismissed as a threat pretty swiftly. 

“Are you Diego’s brother?” she asked softly. 

Was that all he was? Diego’s brother? Regardless of the indignity, he responded with an affirmative, and watched her attempt to deal with the assassins. He still wasn’t well enough to take care of them himself, so he let her do her thing, even though he knew she’d be no match for them. Instead, he turned back to the vent cover, and pulled it off. Just as he’d thought, there was something concealed behind it. He ignored the gunshots and pondered what it could be. Deciding it didn’t matter much at the moment, he pushed it and himself through the vent system, even as Hazel and Cha-Cha dealt with the interloper. By the time they finished, he was long gone. Sometimes strategic retreat was the only option. He would find them again when he was ready. 

Some of the assassin’s ghosts followed him, but he didn’t bother with them at the moment. His power over the dead had returned almost in full, and yet neither Frank nor Ben had returned to him yet. He wasn’t used to worrying, but in this case he felt at least somewhat justified. If Frank wasn’t going to be around for awhile, he usually let Klaus know, or at least borrowed energy from him first. 

Klaus sighed and finally deemed himself far enough from the motel. He ducked into an alleyway and leaned against the wall. This briefcase was really fucking annoying. Almost like it had been shaped in the most inconvenient way possible. No wonder Hazel had whined about it so much. He’d just go through it now to see if there was anything worth keeping. If it was only weapons, or something like that, it’d be easier to just ditch it now. He flicked open the clasps, and opened the case. 

And-

Then-

He-

Hit-

The-

Ground. 

Klaus had just gone through hours of torture, but he suddenly felt even worse. He had only closed his eyes for a moment, but now they were screwed shut. He opened his eyes and - he met the eyes of another young man (god damn was he gorgeous), but he was dressed as a soldier, laying in bed, and Klaus had just been in an abandoned alleyway. What the fuck was going on? 

There was a lot of screaming and yelling, some loud machinery in the background, and were those explosions? Where was he? His body didn’t feel quite like it belonged to him anymore, and he - just - couldn’t -

“You got mud in your ears, boy? Get dressed!” A man who was dressed, sounded, and looked like a drill sergeant yelled at him. He ignored any protest Klaus possibly could’ve stuttered out. “War’s not going to wait for you to get pretty!”

He continued talking after that, but Klaus didn’t really hear the words. War? He put on the pants that were thrust towards him, felt a helmet get put on his head, accepted the boots pushed his way, but he almost didn’t feel involved in the actions. 

He had been in an alleyway in 2019. Now, he was in the middle of some war (which one or where was a whole different set of questions). He had wondered what the briefcase he stole was. Now he knew. It was their fucking time machine. And now he was wherever -  _ whenever _ \- here was, with no idea how to work it or get back. Just fucking great. 

One of the other soldiers, the one who he’d first seen when he arrived, helped him finish getting dressed, and handed him a gun. He then tried to usher Klaus out of the tent, and Klaus barely managed to ensure the briefcase was safe, before he was suddenly thrust into the fighting. 

He needed to try to find Frank or Ben, and he needed to figure out when and where he was, but for now, survival came first. He shot his gun at whoever they were pointed at (and for once Dead Old Dad’s lessons came in handy) with all the other soldiers, and overall just acted as though he fit in and was supposed to be there. Acted like he hadn’t just been tortured for more than half a day. That second part was harder than the first. 

He didn’t know how long it had been when they were finally relieved from their positions, but his fingers were stiff and cramped around the gun, and he felt slightly deafened from the combination of yelling and gunshots. There were an astounding number of ghosts on the battlefield, and he’d had some difficulty determining living enemies from dead ones, but considering he didn’t have the time or energy for creating a barrier right now, he mainly just aimed for those without an obvious wound. He'd obviously done well enough, because he was surrounded by the soldiers' camaraderie and received several pats on the back. 

They were shuffled towards what seemed to be a mess tent, and Klaus accepted his rations in a daze. He was so fucking tired. He ate what was given to him, and he was sure it would have tasted disgusting if he weren't so hungry. One of the others who was also finished led him to a different tent, and he barely managed to sit on the bed he was pushed towards before he fell unconscious. Everything else could wait until he woke up. 

* * *

Morning was a revelation, and not the good kind. He sort of expected the previous evening to be some twisted dream, but instead he woke up surrounded by other soldiers. The sleep and food had done him well, and he woke up thinking much more clearly. He had already known his kidnappers were time travelers, and their victims had only made that more clear. The most recent one, nipples guy, had been the most cognizant due to the fact that his death was so recent, and also the most helpful. They were sent messages through some mysterious system, and just did whatever the message said. It made sense that they would keep their time machine close at hand. He never would have figured it for a briefcase, but considering the whole suits thing, their Commission obviously had an aesthetic they were going for. It was convenient that Klaus had stolen their briefcase because it meant they were stuck in one place, but inconvenient because now he was stuck somewhere completely different. He had no idea how the briefcase worked. Opening it again would just be a gamble. He needed more information or a second opinion. 

Klaus checked to make sure the briefcase was safely tucked away underneath one of the bunks and then left the tent. There were only a few others moving around the camp, appearing to be picking up after the battle last night. The fighting he had been thrust into was an assault on the camp, he remembered. It was quiet now, so his side must have been successful. He was greeted cheerfully with smiles and nods. Since no one seemed to be expecting anything from him at the moment, he indicated that he was going to go off and relieve himself (not totally a lie… his bladder was nearly aching), and was warned they would be packing up and moving on soon. 

Klaus made his way away from the camp until he was sure he had some measure of privacy and learned from the dead along the way that apparently they were fighting the Vietcong…Vietnam War, then. Luckily he had arrived among American soldiers instead of the Vietnamese. First he relieved himself as he'd said, and then he reached for his ghostly companions. 

He tried Ben first, because he cared less about how rude it would be to disturb him from whatever he was doing. Also Ben was usually easier to grab for whatever reason. Regardless, his efforts seemed fruitless, and he did recognize that it was before his brother had even been born. Maybe his powers couldn't transcend time. He would try Frank too, just to be sure. 

Klaus closed his eyes, and reached out for the familiar presence of his friend. For a while there was nothing, but then - it didn't feel quite right, but it had to be Frank. Unconsciously stretching out his "Hello" arm, he clenched his hand into a fist, then opened his eyes. 

Frank looked the same as he ever did, and Klaus sighed with relief, right up until he began screaming and clawing just like all the other long dead. He instinctively pushed the member of the insane dead away from him, but not as far as he normally would. He stared into the eyes of the first person who had ever cared about him, and then suddenly it hit him. 

This was Frank before he'd ever met him.  _ Klaus hadn't met him yet _ . The first time Klaus saw Frank, he was just a kid, and Frank was already sane. But Klaus was  _ in the past _ now. All along, it had been _ him _ who restored Frank's sanity. This right here was the moment Frank began to care for him. Stretching out with the power Frank had encouraged him to train (of course, it made sense now), Klaus pushed his own energy into Frank's spirit, working to reverse what time and death had done to his mind. 

It took several long moments, but he knew it had worked when Frank fell silent. 

"Frank," Klaus smiled. "I'm Klaus. And one day, very far in the future, you're going to make me into the man I am today."

"Klaus," Frank tested the word. 

"When you meet me, my name will still be Number Four. I had a really terrible father. You're the one that helped me see that, helped me reach my full potential, my full power over the dead."

"Tell me more," Frank suggested, looking interested. 

So Klaus did. He told him all about growing up in the Academy, his horrible siblings, learning to control his powers and return corporeality to the dead he chose, and to push away the ones he didn't like. He had to give the abridged version, since he didn't know how long he had, but it was a relief to talk to his friend again. He finally reached the part about the two maniacs breaking into his house and kidnapping and torturing him just because his brother returned and was trying to stop the apocalypse (okay, so he ranted a lot during this part, but who could blame him? He had a right to be agitated with his captors), and his current situation, stuck in the past with no certain way to get home. 

Frank had listened thoughtfully during the whole story, and Klaus expressed how glad he was that the man was here with him for this. 

"It seems that you're a failure, Number Four," Frank finally spoke. 

"What?" Klaus was shocked. Frank had never sounded that… mean. Not towards him, anyways. He'd always been snide towards his relatives, but never Klaus.

"If there was one thing I would have tried to instill in someone learning under me, it's that caring is a weakness. But look at you - falling over yourself for me. You're a major disappointment. I don't know who I become in the future, but I should have found someone more worthy than you."

"Why are you saying these things? This isn't like you at all! You did teach me those lessons, I learned what you wanted! I already told you, you made me who I am!" Klaus had to restrain himself from yelling. 

"You're weak. Just another weakling who should've been offed when someone had the chance. More people ought to take out the trash, like I did." Frank smiled his ghastly grin, and Klaus remembered the occasions where Frank discussed murdering his disappointment of a wife and their children.

But no - Klaus wasn't weak! He hadn't been weak in years!  _ Frank _ was the one who had taught him to be strong! Almost everything he had done, he'd done for Frank. He'd shaped his whole life around the man. 

"The only worth in other people is what you can get out of them. You might have power over the dead, but you're still just a scared little boy, clinging to scraps. No wonder my older self seemed so fond of you. You're practically a buffet, ripe for the taking. Leaking that power everywhere...it wouldn't be difficult to get hooked. A man could feed off you for years without making a dent."

Feed off him…?

Everything suddenly turned to ice inside him. 

He couldn't breathe. 

He hadn't noticed the absence until this Frank had pointed it out. For as far back as he could remember, there seemed to be a weight that went along with his powers. He always thought that's just how things were. When his powers were suppressed, the sensation went away. But so did Frank. All this time, all these years, and he'd never questioned it. But right now, in this moment? He felt something latch onto him, a weight applied, and suddenly he felt drained. 

He knew without having to think about it that it was Frank, demonstrating what he was. What he had always been. He'd dealt with enough of them leeching off billionaire CEOs to have the answer without having to reach for it. Frank was a malignant spirit, and Klaus had welcomed him, offered himself up. He had let the disgusting parasite teach him, raise him, shape who he became, all while it was feeding off of him. He'd only ever been a meal to the man. Never a student, never a surrogate child, never anything approaching family. Dinner. 

He'd given so much to Frank over the years, ever since he'd grown better in touch with his powers. When they began their forays into corporeality, he'd willingly funneled so much of his power into Frank, supposedly testing his limits. When Frank decided he needed to be elsewhere, "taking care of business," Klaus had always fed him with power first, to ensure he wouldn't weaken. He'd never even thought to question where it was he was going, what he was doing. 

He reached out with his power again, gripped the very fabric of Frank’s soul with his mind, then paused. He wanted to rip the other man apart for what he’d done, but. He hadn’t been lying when he said Frank forged the man he’d become. If he destroyed Frank now, before he ever had a chance to reach him as a child, who would Klaus have become? Would he have ever learned control? Would he be a sycophant like Ben? Without Frank he never would have become as strong as he currently was. He was sure of that. He didn’t know what all he had lost because the other had been feeding off him, but he was also sure that the longer the man was gone, the more he would recover what was taken. No, he couldn’t destroy Frank yet. (It had absolutely nothing to do with him still caring for the other, regardless of what he had just learned. No siree.)

Whatever denial he was in, Frank didn’t have the same limitations. The man let out a loud burst of laughter. “I was right then. You won’t hurt me, because you still _ care _ . Useless.”

Klaus closed his eyes so he didn’t have to look at Frank, then used his power again, pushing Frank as far away from him as he could, and ensuring he wouldn’t be able to find his way back while Klaus was still in this time period. 

With that done, Klaus rejoined the other soldiers, and set about helping tear down the camp. (And if the intense labor kept him from thinking during the duration, well. He was just doing his part.) He would have to revisit the briefcase later, once they were out of an active war zone. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this chapter really kicked my butt. It's the reason there was a hiatus for as long as there was. It just didn't want to be written, but here it is.  
> I'm still not entirely satisfied with it, but I've tried to go back and get it right multiple times and it just isn't happening, so~ Whatever.  
> There's a sex scene in this chapter. It does not get very explicit, but if that's not your thing, feel free to skip it. It's very obvious which set of paragraphs it is, and I separated the only plot-important bit from the rest of that chunk.

**_Chapter 5_ **

When Klaus had used the term ‘child soldiers’ to describe himself and the others in the Academy, he’d never known how accurate he was. Now that he was living and serving as an actual soldier, all those lessons he’d never fully managed to suppress became useful. 

Guns had been less of a focus than hand-to-hand combat, but anything Reginald Hargreeves taught the children was required to be learned to absolute perfection. Because they were often fighting armed criminals, that meant knowing how to handle guns was on that list. He had never used the specific model of rifle that was supplied to him, but after several weeks of skirmishes, he was officially known as one of the best shots in the unit. 

Actual physical combat, on the other hand… well. He was lucky that the war was fought with weapons, not fists. Training at the main base, “Tan Son Nhut Air Base,” included physical combat anyways, and while Klaus knew the strategies and moves better than any of the other men, he just didn’t have the muscle to back it up (at first). Unlike his father however, the sergeant was impressed and encouraging. 

All of the soldiers were impressed and encouraging. 

Klaus had always picked up new things quickly - he’d had to - so he fell into the lingo and routines very swiftly. It was clear to everyone in his squad that he’d never actually gone to boot camp, but that wasn’t important to them. He was here, fighting, just like the rest of them. Dave took him under his wing most of all. It was from Dave he learned what Sarge had been yelling the first night: ‘Charlie’s on the wire.’ Charlie referred to the Vietcong. It was taken from the phonetic alphabet abbreviation, Victor Charlie, and dropped to just Charlie. The wire meant the outskirts of their camp. It was important to know what everyone was talking about so that when they came under fire again (which happened multiple times during their retreat to Saigon), everyone was on the same page. 

It astounded Klaus that no one really questioned where he had come from. The squad was very tight knit, a closeness that can only be formed from fighting for their lives together. This was nothing like what he’d had with his family. Their father had encouraged competition between them, something One and Two and Five had thrown themselves into. They all wanted to be the best. Their triumphs were theirs alone, and used as a benchmark to berate the rest of them with. Here, one man’s success was the squad’s success. They worked with each other instead of against each other. 

It was like nothing Klaus had ever experienced. Every time he looked at the briefcase and considered trying to use it again, he found himself drawn back into the feeling of being part of a team and decided to wait. (It’s not like he could actually die here, after all.)

It took a month of fighting and marching to reach the airbase in Saigon which was their current objective. Apparently there was some huge attack on the base right before Klaus had arrived in 1968, along with multiple other offenses which were launched at the same time. 

All his knowledge of the future was useless here. He didn’t really know much about the Vietnam War - Dad hadn’t been too concerned with teaching them history when he thought missions were more important. The only thing Klaus remembered about the war was that it was widely regarded as a mistake, and something about protests. 

Now his power over the dead, on the other hand… Klaus was glad he had never managed to find another moment alone to reinstate his barrier to block the dead after the first time he was told about a landmine no one else had noticed. It was a Vietnamese ghost, muttering about how great it would be to see the enemy blown to pieces, who drew his attention. He managed to stop the procession just in time. The others berated him at first, right up until he brushed away the dirt and leaves which had hidden the weapon from view. After that, he made sure to keep a close eye on all the dead soldiers, both the Americans and the enemy. That first mine he had found was considered luck, but as he saved more and more soldiers, he was moved closer to the front of the lines whenever they were marching. 

They always moved in two lines with excessive distance between each of them, weighted down by what had to be at least fifty pounds of supplies (he latched the briefcase onto his backpack, and the others never said a word about it). He couldn’t really get away with using telekinesis to make his load lighter without it swiftly becoming obvious, so Klaus labored on like all the rest, gritting his teeth through the muscle soreness. He much preferred the stretches where they were able to be bussed around (those were unfortunately few and far between - this was an active war zone, after all). 

It was on the first bus ride where he had his first real conversation with Dave. Looking at the man’s soft smile, Klaus had to remind himself that this was the 60's, and the army disapproved of gays. It didn’t matter how attractive Dave was, Klaus didn’t chase straight men. But when Dave smiled at him… that was the first time he considered not bothering with finding a way to work the briefcase. 

Their friendship only deepened when they finally reached Saigon. The battle had been won long before they reached the city. While they initially had some work reinforcing the airbase in case of further attacks, it quickly became obvious that there was no further incursion incoming. Because Klaus’ squad had been on the frontlines for significantly longer than Klaus had been with them, this meant they were given a lot of downtime. At the start, they were encouraged to stay on base, which is where Klaus received a tongue lashing for “losing his dog tags,” and sent to the personnel office to acquire new ones. He also was forced to do a shitload of push-ups, and only avoided punishment detail by the number of lives he’d managed to save on the way to the base. (He’d been told that if he ever lost them again, the punishment would be latrine duty… he’d watched the other soldiers move and burn the giant barrels of waste, and he very much would never be part of that.)

The constant exercise and training helped Klaus pack on a lot of muscle, but he was still glad when they were finally told they could have some time off in the city. The first thing he did was grab Dave and drag them both to a store for party clothes. Dave chose something extremely tame, but Klaus picked out something he could actually feel comfortable in (although he did avoid anything too feminine - he wanted to have fun, not deal with slurs). They met up with some of the others from their squad at the disco, and Klaus remembered his joking backstory for Five’s eyeball quest (“we met at the… disco!”). He realized it was the first time he thought about the apocalypse quest for quite some time. He ignored that in favor of joining the others on the dance floor. 

This - this was exactly what he had needed. He had fallen into the soldier mindset far too easily. Yes, he had been avoiding going home, but really, what was waiting for him there? A bunch of assholes for siblings, an asshole for a mentor, a dead asshole of a father, and an impending apocalypse. At least here, in the war, he was surrounded by people who actually liked him. It wasn’t something he could ever remember wanting, but now that he had it, he wasn’t sure he wanted to give it up. And it wasn’t like the war would be able to kill him - nothing could kill him! He wasn’t truly risking his life here, like the others. And maybe the 60s weren’t an optimal time for someone like him, but he had the Stonewall Riots to look forward to. Once he made it to the States, he was sure he could find other members of the LGBT community. And in the States, his knowledge of the future would definitely come in use - he wouldn’t even need blackmail to make money, he would just need to invest in all the companies and inventions which he already knows will make it big. 

Klaus was brought out of his thoughts by someone stumbling into him. He turned with a joking fist raised, and met Dave’s eyes. Dave who had been there for him this whole time, who had sat and laughed and joked with him for hours, who was currently staring at him with… longing? Admiration? Love? No. It couldn’t be. He was used to gazes filled with lust and hunger. He knew what that looked like, and this wasn’t it. 

When Dave brought him to the bar, he indulged in a few shots with the others, but he made sure he didn’t have enough to get drunk. This was still a war zone, and he didn’t need to lose his powers when there could be danger at any moment. 

They moved back onto the dance floor with some of the girls in the club, but somehow he and Dave wound up orbiting each other again. He didn’t know what it was that kept drawing him back to Dave. Normally if he was attracted to someone, they fucked and he got it out of his system. But with Dave… he didn’t feel like he wanted just a quick fuck. 

Somehow, they ended up in one of the back rooms, where the music was quieter and there were no other patrons. Despite the amount of open space, Dave chose to lean against the wall directly next to him, their shoulders pressing together. 

“You looked like you were having fun out there,” Dave turned a shy smile his way. 

“I love the disco. Don’t you?” Klaus grinned. 

“It’s nice,” Dave agreed, “although I’m not nearly as confident as you are out there. Every eye was on you…” he trailed off. 

“Including yours?” Klaus waggled his eyebrows, expecting a joke. 

“Yes, including mine,” Dave stated firmly. “Klaus, you are _beautiful_.”

Klaus had done more than his share of clubbing, and he’d received more than his share of compliments from guys (and gals) looking to get into his pants, but he’d never been called beautiful, and never in that tone. 

He stared at Dave in a sort of stunned disbelief, and Dave raised one of his hands and gently cupped Klaus’ cheek (so cautious, like he was cradling something precious), and with that look of devotion in his eyes - Klaus _melted_ into him. He’d never been touched so carefully in his life. 

His lips parted, but he couldn’t find words to respond, and Dave was so close, so warm, and he leaned forwards… 

The kiss was simple, nothing more than a press of their lips together, but somehow it was better than any he’d ever had before. He tried to lean further, to deepen it, but Dave held him steady. He was slow, and careful, and tender. Klaus knew kissing, but he’d never had one like this. It didn’t feel like it was leading to more, like it was just a precursor to sex. It felt like they could stand there for hours doing nothing more than this, and Klaus could be happy with it. 

What was Dave doing to him? He’d never been this soft about _anything_. 

He got the urge to pull away, to back off, to find someone for a quick fuck and act like this had never happened. It’s what he should do. What Frank would want him to do. Frank would be so disappointed with him right now - no. He didn’t care what Frank thought anymore. His opinion didn’t matter, Klaus could do whatever the fuck he wanted, and he wanted to stay here, with Dave. 

That first night, Dave didn’t let it go further than kissing, no matter how much Klaus pushed. He said he wanted to do this right. And by this, he meant an actual relationship. A real, adult romance between two men in the 1960's in the middle of a fucking war zone. (Klaus was besotted). 

They stole time together just as they had before, but now, all of their conversations were filled with the undertones of their relationship. It felt _intimate_ in a way he had never experienced before. Their time together was filled with firsts that Klaus had never anticipated. Just as he had never anticipated enjoying it so much. Dave was always so careful with him, as though he was something delicate which could break easily. No matter what Klaus did to try to break that impression, it never worked. Klaus knew he was harsh, and jaded, and a pessimist, but Dave was such a bright, shining optimist, that Klaus could actually see building a future with him. It terrified him in a way nothing ever had before. It was wonderful. 

They had a relatively peaceful month in Saigon before they were redeployed back to the actual fighting. When they received the orders, the whole squad went out together, and they all got matching tattoos with their brigade stated proudly. It almost reminded Klaus of receiving his umbrella with the others, except that was a brand of ownership, and this was a mark of pride. They were a part of the 173rd, the first brigade to enter combat in Vietnam, and the most skilled soldiers in the fight. They were on the front lines, and were a necessary part of the war effort. This time, when the others tried to pull him into a hug, Klaus returned it happily. _This_ is what a team felt like. _This_ is what family felt like. The Academy had never been a real family. They were just a bunch of soldiers living under the same roof. Only, he didn’t even want to call them soldiers anymore, because that was an insult to his unit. They were a bunch of snobbish, militant, children (...yeah, Klaus included. But he was learning. The others never had.). 

It was harder to steal time together while in the field, but that didn’t mean it was impossible. Whenever possible, Klaus and Dave were joined at the hip. They maintained a platonic air around the other men, but Klaus had never known there were so many parts to a relationship outside of intimate acts. When Dave finally asked him about his family, Klaus didn’t hesitate when he gave the whole truth. He spoke of mysterious births, a billionaire who never should have been approved to adopt children, a torturous upbringing with six other siblings, and all their unique abilities. He had been prepared to offer a demonstration as proof when Dave asked for it, and was astounded when Dave immediately accepted his word for it. No one had ever believed in him like this before. (He still demonstrated his telekinesis the next time they were alone, using it to hold Dave against a tree. He still insisted they didn’t have actual sex until they had an opportunity to do it properly (there was a proper way to fuck?), but he did concede to more passionate kissing, to Klaus’ delight.) 

It was six months into their relationship (seven months since Klaus had landed in the past), and they hadn’t even had sex yet, when Dave first said “I love you.” It was the first time the words had ever been directed towards him, and Klaus was dumbfounded. Dave was staring at him so earnestly, even as he explained that it was alright if Klaus couldn’t say it back yet, but they were in the middle of a war and could be separated at any time, and he needed Klaus to know before it was too late. 

Klaus didn’t even know what love truly felt like, but he imagined it was something like the fluttering feeling in his chest whenever he saw Dave looking at him like that. Dave knew him better than anyone else ever had, and loved and accepted him anyway. He couldn’t speak the words back, and as Dave had promised, he wasn’t hurt or offended by it, but that night, Klaus waited until everyone else was asleep and then slipped out of camp with the briefcase. 

He walked until he was outside of hearing distance, then set the case down and stared at it. Home - he had never had anything he’d truly thought felt like home. The future wasn’t his home. LA wasn’t his home. The Academy was the farthest thing from a home. But Dave - Dave was _everything_. 

With a flick of his fingers, the briefcase tore itself apart, metal components rattling as it exploded. 

This was his home now. 

After months of fighting, Klaus’ squad returned to Saigon and finally were given downtime again. He managed to sweet talk the Sarge into giving them all a whole night to themselves (much to his squad’s pleasure). Almost immediately, he dragged Dave to a motel. He had waited so long for this, for Dave to finally give in. 

“Almost,” because Dave insisted they go out for dinner first, in what felt suspiciously like a date despite the lack of romantic atmosphere. 

But finally, they had their own room in a cheap motel, and a nice queen bed. 

The moment the door was closed, Klaus was pushing Dave back, removing their clothes. His motions were almost frantic, and he hoped the months of buildup didn’t cheapen the actual reward. 

“Klaus,” Dave murmured against his lips. “It’s okay, you can slow down. We have all night.” 

“I’ve waited so long for this Dave, I don’t want to wait any longer,” Klaus was already down to his underwear, an expert at quickly removing his clothes. Dave was slightly more stubborn and had only lost his shirt. 

“I told you, I want to do this right,” Dave gave that soft smile Klaus loved so much, and Klaus could never say no to him. He took a step back, spreading his arms wide. He would let Dave take the lead here. Whatever Dave wanted. 

Dave stepped closer to him, pressed their chests together, and then reached a hand up to cup his cheek, just as he had that first night in the club. He held them together like that for a few moments, not kissing, just breathing the same air. When he finally closed the last few inches, Klaus melted into his embrace, struggling not to push for more than what Dave was offering. 

He needn’t have worried too much, because the kiss was certainly one of their more passionate ones, but somehow it felt different than when Klaus himself was leading it. He found himself encircled by Dave’s arms, and gently led to the bed, their lips not separating for more than an instant. Dave’s pants finally hit the ground before he joined Klaus on the bed. 

He wasn’t sure what exactly he expected, when everything with Dave had already been so different from his past experiences, but he thought they would jump into the main event now. 

Instead, Dave seemed content to lay with him, exploring each other’s mouths. He didn’t know how long had passed when Dave finally moved again, but he merely was taking his time, exploring his body, and avoiding the one area Klaus really wanted him to touch. 

“Dave, please,” Klaus whimpered, as fingers danced along his thighs. 

Dave smiled at him from between his legs, and Klaus nearly turned into a puddle. Goddamn. 

But finally, finally, Dave removed Klaus’ underwear, and bent his head further down. 

Klaus threw his head back as Dave’s mouth engulfed him. He was so caught up in the sensation, he hardly noticed when a slick finger prodded between his cheeks (when and where had Dave found lube?). As with everything else, Dave took his time with this too, despite it not truly being necessary. Klaus’d had plenty of sex with no actual preparation before. Still, it felt amazing, and it was _Dave_ , so that was even better. 

By the time Dave finally deemed it enough, it felt like Klaus had been begging for hours. He was impatient as Dave moved back up his body and kissed him again, barely patient enough for the condom to roll on (he knew how big of a deal AIDS would blow up to be at some point in the future). They remained face-to-face as Dave pressed inside, holding him so carefully, and moving so slowly… Even once he was fully seated, he was so gentle, not moving at all even as Klaus begged for more. He waited until Klaus’ voice died down to move, and each thrust was like a revelation. Klaus had fucked before, he’d had sex in every position imaginable, but never like this. He’d never been loved like this. He didn’t realize there were tears falling from his eyes until Dave brushed them away, kissing the tracks left behind. Dave Dave Dave Dave, he chanted. It was the only thing in his mind. I love you, I love you, I love you, Dave said back, both with and without words. When they climaxed, it was together, and Klaus had never come so hard in his life. 

Afterwards, he lay in Dave’s embrace, and the words that had been building all this time fell from his lips. “I love you too,” Klaus nearly whispered. “And I’m not just saying that because of the mind-blowing sex, although I loved that too.” He felt Dave smile against his back. “I didn’t think I was even capable of this. Of feeling for someone like this. But I do. I love you.”

“I love you too,” Dave responded, and Klaus believed him. 

The next day, Klaus found a discreet tattoo artist, and had a symbol of his love written across his abdomen. He wanted this, needed this, a constant reminder of this feeling. “Klaus loves Dave.” None of the other men in the unit speak or read Vietnamese despite their current location, so that was a safer language for it than English. 

  
  
  
  
  


Hiding behind sandbags, surrounded by his squad and gunfire, Klaus had never felt more alive. He adjusted his grip on his weapon, taking advantage of a brief lull in shots to fire back. Almost immediately he faced return fire, and he dove back down, cackling. “Christ on a cracker! That was a close one, eh Dave?”

He turned to glance at his partner in crime, and froze. 

“Dave?” he pushed against his shoulder, and Dave slumped over, revealing the wound in his chest. 

No. NO. 

“Medic!” Klaus screamed, even as he tried to stop the bleeding. He already knew it was too late. “No, no, no, no, no!” This was the man he’d left everything for! He wasn’t allowed to die!

He pressed harder against Dave’s chest, even as Dave coughed and struggled to breathe. His palms wet with blood, Klaus pulled back slightly to get a better look at the wound, then froze. 

This… This was not a wound from enemy fire. This was the exit wound. The shot had come from behind them. 

It felt like the world had stopped around him, the gunfire and explosions freezing along with everything and everyone else. And then he realized, it _had_ all stopped. _He_ had stopped it. He was holding the entire battlefield, enemies and friendlies alike, his telekinesis applied on a much larger scale than anything he had ever even attempted. He reached out, flinging his power outwards, searching, searching, even as he clutched Dave to his chest, and then - there. 

Klaus opened his eyes. He was holding a gun that was far too modern to belong to this time period, eye still pressed to the scope. Through it he could see his own body, could see Dave’s body, could see the unnaturally still battlefield. 

He pulled his eye away from the gun and looked down. He was wearing a tailored suit, much too clean to belong here, on the front lines of Vietnam. He was perched in a sniper’s nest, a cursed briefcase resting near his feet. Klaus set the sniper rifle down, reached for the pistol he could feel holstered at his waist, and placed the barrel between his teeth. 

When he pulled the trigger, he found himself back in his own body, Dave’s blood staining his hands. He saw Dave try to say something, but the pain and blood loss was too much… He coughed again, then fell back to the ground, still. 

“NO!” Klaus yelled, screamed, cried. And with his yell, the world resumed. The men around him started yelling, panicking, but there were no more shots being fired at them. Despite the panicked soldiers, there were no more shots being fired at all. All the enemies on the other side were dead. Upon inspection, it would be found that it looked as though they’d all pointed their guns at each other and pulled the trigger, but Klaus wasn’t aware enough to even notice his squad cautiously leaving to investigate. He remained clutching Dave’s body, waiting. He’d died violently, his ghost should already be here. Where was he?

“Dave!” he cried out again, and then he slumped over as everything went black. 

Klaus woke up. He wished he hadn’t. There was no moment of disjointedness, no brief second where he forgot what had happened - no. Dave was dead. He’d been killed, not as part of this war they were fighting in, but by the same assholes who wanted to trigger the apocalypse. 

He looked around, and found he was in one of the tents back in camp. He was on a bedroll on the ground. There were a few others who were also unconscious, and multiple dead in the same tent. Dave wasn’t among them. 

Dave knew about his powers, and Dave was dead. If he wanted to see Klaus, he would already be here. 

Klaus felt empty inside, like he’d been hollowed out to make room for something new, but now the new was gone. Or maybe it had never actually arrived. He pushed himself to his feet with still-bloodstained hands, and made his way out of the tent. He immediately knew where their dead had been stored - the tent was swarming with new ghosts, clamoring and crying. 

It was a simple matter to enter the tent, and find Dave’s body. As he’d thought, there was no one else around. 

He knew Dave wasn’t really here anymore, that this empty shell wasn’t the man he - the man he had loved, but he also knew what Dave’s faith meant to him. 

He knelt next to the body, and grasped its hand. He would take up shemira until someone else could. He would do this for Dave, and then he would take down the fuckers who killed him. 

When Klaus was finally relieved from his position, he took Dave’s dog tags with him, and left his own clenched in the man’s fist. There were enough men left in their squad that there was no way Dave’s body would be misidentified. He made it clear to the soldier who had entered - one of the newer guys that he didn’t really know well yet - that Dave could not be left alone until they were ready to send him back to the States. He was sure he had scared the kid, still covered in blood as he was, but he couldn’t really find it in himself to care. 

Klaus took his gun and a spare ammo belt and nothing else. Then he walked back into the jungle. He hadn’t known exactly where they were when he woke up, but it was easy to follow the trail of the dead back to where the battle had been. 

Once there, he used his power and pulled the assassin in front of him. The man was short and balding, inconspicuous. “Why Dave?” He demanded. 

“What, I don’t -” the man stumbled over his words. 

Klaus narrowed his eyes, and pressed with his power. “Why. Dave?”

“I - I don’t know. I’m just a worker bee, not a case manager. I get a name, I terminate them, that’s how it works. I don’t choose the targets!” The man looked terrified, but Klaus couldn’t empathize. 

“You’re going to tell me everything you know about your organization, and then you’re going to tell me how to work your stupid briefcase.”

After wringing every possible detail from a very cooperative spirit, Klaus reached out again, and gripped the very fabric of the man’s soul, as he had to Frank only ten months earlier. This monster had killed Dave. He could no longer be allowed to exist. It wasn’t something he had ever tried before, but he found it very instinctual. Within moments, all that was left of the assassin was tattered remnants of his soul, which quickly drifted away. The screams had been nearly therapeutic. 

With a flash of blue, Klaus opened his eyes in 1955. The Temps Commission. He needed to find the Handler. Either she gave the order, or she should know who would. 

He appeared in what seemed to be a courtyard. The biggest building had smoke pouring out of one of the windows, and there were people running out of the building screaming. Someone had beaten him here. 

There was no point in asking nicely for directions when everyone was screaming and running, so Klaus pulled at one of the freshest spirits. The older woman who appeared before him told him her name was Gloria, and she was a fount of information. He found out who was in charge of the apocalypse, where the Handler would be headed, and what had happened here. Five had happened here. The Five who looked thirteen, that is. The little psychopath had both helped and hindered - he now knew more than he would’ve if Gloria hadn’t been killed (apparently she was a “very vital cog”), but he had also taken part of the pleasure of destroying this place away from him. Whatever. He’d just have to be more thorough than Five had been. 

He ignored the busy bees running around him (without noticing a soldier whose arms were covered in blood? What must their lives be like…) and entered the main building. He followed Gloria’s instructions and made his way into a room full of typewriters. (There were so many rooms like this he would have gotten lost without his guide.) This specific room was empty except for a darker-skinned woman who was flipping frantically through several folders. 

“That’s her,” Gloria confirmed. 

Klaus considered firing his gun, but he didn’t want to ruin any of the files. Instead, he snapped her neck with his telekinesis before she even took note of him - too kind of a death for a person like her, but he was out of patience. 

Her ghost emerged very soon after, helped along by Klaus’ rage. “Hello Dot. I hear you know a thing or two about the apocalypse. You’re going to tell me everything you know.” 

When Klaus was finally finished with the Commission, he left a smoldering ruin devoid of both life and unlife. Let them try to rebuild from that. He took his time with the Handler’s death. She’d already been damaged from what Five had done, but she had never expected him. She was the one who figured out Dave’s death would be necessary to return Klaus back to 2019. The only problem is, she was working with out-dated information. 

Five had changed everything when he chose to leave the Commission and travel back in time. In fact, the dominoes from that one act had already been enough to at the very least postpone the apocalypse. It had also led to Hazel and Cha-Cha being sent after him, which resulted in Klaus’ kidnapping, which gave him the briefcase, and left him stranded in 1968. If Five had never come back, then Klaus would never have been sent back in time, and never would have summoned Frank. He would never have had a relationship with Frank at all. And from the information in the Commission’s files, well. Klaus had done the right thing in not destroying him yet. The Klaus that never received that tutelage, who had never gotten stronger, had fallen so deep into drugs that he didn’t even know he had powers beyond seeing the dead. And that was the Klaus the Commission had been anticipating, all this time. It was truly a shame they hadn’t been more thorough, but then, he guessed he was the one better off for it. 

All of the Commission’s dead had a number of secrets they had sworn never to reveal, and all of them fed those secrets to Klaus. When he was done with them, he ripped their spirits to shreds. (Well, some of them. Most he saved for later - there were a lot of dead to go through). He certainly had done enough damage that the Temps Aeternalis would be left reeling. 

Klaus took the last surviving briefcase, the one he’d arrived with, and returned to 2019. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a couple notes. I am not a soldier/veteran, and while I did some searches on the Vietnam War and consulted a friend who IS a veteran (although she served in Iraq). I did my best to maintain an air of accuracy. The 173rd was actually a real brigade, so I did some research on what battles they fought in, but there wasn't much for the time Klaus arrived. What did happen was the start of the Tet Offensive in January, so in my timeline, that's when he arrived in '68 - January. During the Tet Offensive, there was a genuine attack on Saigon, including the base mentioned in this story. But as I said, I am far from an expert on the Vietnam War. If you saw anything I got wrong, feel free to let me know so I can fix it. (The battle where Dave dies obviously doesn't have any actual historical relevancy).


	6. Chapter 6

**_Chapter 6_ **

Klaus opened his eyes to see his bedroom in the Academy. 

Almost a year since he'd been taken from here… 

He took the briefcase and buried it in the back of his closet - unfortunately it was too big and bulky for his go-to hiding spot. 

With that done, he looked down at his bloodstained arms, and sighed. 

A bath was first on his agenda. Once he was clean, he would summon Frank. (And he should probably find out what happened to Ben…) Then he would take care of Hazel and Cha-Cha. The family meeting where he aired all the dirty laundry was last on his list. Before that could happen, he had to work out whether Five had already returned to the Commission yet. 

It wasn’t until he started stripping out of his uniform that he realized the blood wasn’t entirely his enemies’. There were multiple wounds scattered across his body that he hadn’t even felt until this moment. It seems rage and adrenaline had successfully drowned everything else out. Luckily none of it was too serious, so he didn’t have to involve Mom, but it was definitely inconvenient. 

He sank into the water with a groan. His muscles hurt, and the water made his cuts sting, but it felt so good. Even during downtime in the war, he’d never been able to have a real bath. Quick showers were the most any of them got, and those were few and far between. 

Klaus had to drain and refill the bath multiple times before the water finally remained clear. The cool metal of Dave’s dog tags kept him company as he wiped away the last physical remnant of Dave from his body. Dave… It would have been fifty years for his love whereas it had been less than a day for Klaus. He dreaded the thought of what had happened to Dave’s spirit in the meantime. He never wanted to see Dave’s soft, sweet features twisted like the rest of the insane dead. Maybe, if he was lucky, Dave had successfully passed fully on, but if that were true, there’s nowhere Dave could be but Heaven. Could Klaus really pull him away from that? The person he had been before he met Dave wouldn’t have hesitated. Klaus had always done what had benefited himself the most. And he still would, for the most part, but Dave had become an exception to every rule he’d ever set for himself. 

He shouldn’t decide now. There was plenty of time for that after he finished ruining the Commission’s plans. They had killed Dave to get Klaus back in time for the apocalypse, and now he would ensure it wouldn’t happen. He wouldn’t decide what to do until after he’d finished with his revenge. (He knew Dave wouldn’t approve of his methods, but. Dave wasn’t here because of _them_.)

He finally levered himself out of the bathtub, deciding he was as clean as he was going to get. The soreness really set in as he walked back to his room, along with that infuriating itch that seemed to accompany time travel. 

It was as he was getting dressed that Five showed up. 

“You okay?” was the first thing Five asked, and Klaus was honestly a little taken aback. Asking after his well being? Was this really his brother? 

“Yeah, just… long night,” he mentally snorted at his own statement. 

Five mirrored the response. “More than one, from the looks of it.” 

Ah, so there it was. It wasn’t Klaus that he cared about, it was the fact that he’d time traveled. 

Klaus responded in the affirmative pulling on a shirt. 

“Don’t remember the dog tags.” 

“Yeah, they belonged to a friend.” 

“How about that new tattoo?”

Five had indicated his squad tattoo, not the temple on his stomach. He wondered if Five had seen both and didn’t care enough to comment, or if he just preferred the one with a clear indicator of where he had been. 

“Like I said, it was a long night,” he waved his Goodbye hand at Five in what should have been an obvious dismissal. Unfortunately Five didn’t accept that. 

“You did it, didn’t you?” he sounded eager. 

“What are you talking about?” Klaus played dumb. He wanted to know what made it so obvious to Five, beyond the tattoos and tags. 

“You know I can recognize the symptoms, Klaus.” At the lack of response, Five continued. “The jet lag. Full body itch. Headache that feels like someone shoved a box of cotton up into your nose and through your brain. You gonna tell me about it?” 

Hmph. He’d have to do better at hiding the symptoms if he ever used the briefcase again. 

He considered it for a few moments, then decided to tell Five at least part of the truth. Hazel and Cha-Cha were all that really remained of the Commission right now, and they were still actively working to stop Five. Best his brother knows at least some of the details to be better prepared. 

“Your pals. When they shot up the house and couldn’t find you, they took me instead.” 

“And in return, you stole their briefcase,” Five sounded positively gleeful - the happiest Klaus had heard him since he’d returned. 

“Yeah. It was obviously important to them, hid it in the vents and everything. I wanted to see what was in it, so I opened it.” 

“And the next thing you knew, you were… where? Or should I say when?” 

“What difference does it make?” Klaus knew his brother didn’t truly care. His focus was the case, not him. 

“What diff - okay. How long were you gone?”

"A year."

“A year?” his brother stopped pacing and whirled on him. “Do you know what this means?” 

“Yeah, I’m ten months older now.” Hooray for being the second oldest sibling. 

“This isn’t any sort of joke, Klaus. Hazel and Cha-Cha will do whatever they can to get the briefcase. Where is it now?” Five demanded. And ah, there it was, the whole purpose of this conversation, of Five’s ‘concern.’ 

“Gone. I destroyed it. Poof!” That wasn’t technically a lie - he _had_ destroyed Hazel and Cha-Cha’s briefcase. He wouldn’t tell Five about the second one. 

“What the hell were you thinking?” Five was angry now, all traces of glee vanished. 

“What do you care?”

“What do I care? I needed it, you moron, so I could get back. I could start over!” 

This Five definitely wasn’t the same one who had destroyed part of the Commission. He wondered when exactly that had happened. The family meeting couldn’t really happen until they were all on the same page, and for that, Five needed to hurry up and get his shit together. Either way, this conversation was no longer important. The sooner he left, the sooner Five would go after the assassins, and maybe get their boss involved. If he was being re-recruited, he probably wouldn’t manage to kill two of his coworkers, so Klaus would still get his shot at them. But that meant they needed to live long enough for Five to reach them… Ugh. Klaus hated time travel. He pushed past Five and headed back to the bathroom where he had left the remnants of his uniform. 

“Where are you going?”

“Interrogation’s over,” Klaus used that word deliberately, to see if it would spark anything in Five. A reminder that by his timeline, Klaus had just escaped from being interrogated by his assassin buddies. It didn’t. As expected. (They were never brothers, they just were raised together.) “Just… leave.” 

Five clearly wasn’t happy, but he didn’t follow Klaus either, so whatever. He grabbed his vest off the floor of the bathroom and put it back on, feeling more comfortable with a reminder of his squad, of actual support. He would have to look up what happened to them, after this was all taken care of. He wanted to make sure the survivors were alright (he’d never cared before, but he’d heard about homeless veterans - if any of the men he knew were in that kind of position, he’d have to arrange for some kind of anonymous donation), and for those who had died… If any of them had lingered, he’d ensure they were able to move on. They deserved that much from him. 

He left the rest of his mess behind and made his way to the entrance of the Academy, passing Pogo working on Mom on the way (wow, hadn’t they decided to wait it out? He wondered who had been the one to cut into her, and why Pogo was only now fixing her.). Pogo looked up as he passed, but turned away again without saying anything. 

The chandelier that had been hanging from the entry hall was on the floor, the metal twisted in places. How the fuck had that happened?

Conveniently, just as he had that thought, Diego strolled into the room. 

“What happened here?” he asked, out loud this time. 

“You look like shit,” was the response he received. 

“Oh, why thank you,” he turned to look at Diego, and was startled to see someone hovering over his shoulder. She looked surprised to see him looking at her, and also vaguely familiar. 

“You have to stop him,” she said, “don’t let him leave!”

“Hey, where are you going?” he asked. It suddenly hit him where he knew her from - she was the cop who’d showed up at the hotel room. The dripping wound in her chest showed how well that worked out for her. 

“Nope,” was the instant response, although he stopped walking. 

“He’s going after them… Please, you have to stop him. They’ll kill him, too,” his brother’s tagalong said desperately. 

“What?” he responded to both of them. 

“I’m not giving you a ride,” was the answer from Diego. 

“He wants revenge,” came from the woman. Well, he could definitely understand that. Unfortunately, Hazel and Cha-Cha still have a purpose to fulfill before they could die, and also Klaus got first dibs. 

“Oh, come on man, you know I can’t drive,” Klaus pretended like a ride was his goal the entire time, and the cop smiled at him. She was strange - still a new spirit, yes, but she was following Diego and begging him to stop instead of latching on to her killers. Even newer spirits tended to crow for revenge above all else. Interesting. 

Ignoring Diego’s protests like usual, he followed him out to his car, reclining in the passenger seat. He really didn’t want to be babysitting his brother right now. He _wanted_ to be getting _his_ revenge. He definitely couldn’t do that in front of Diego though. At least not yet. 

He sat in silence, conscious of Diego staring at him multiple times during the trip. 

“You okay?” the second sibling today questioned. It was more annoying this time than with Five, because he didn’t know Diego’s motivation. 

“Wow, this is a first. My brother Klaus is silent. Last time you were this quiet, we were twelve. Ran down the stairs wearing Grace’s heels, tripped over and broke your jaw.” 

Is that how Diego remembered it? Also, Grace? Since when had Diego ever called her anything but Mom? Were they allowed to call the robot by its name, now? What had happened while he was gone? 

“How long was it wired shut?” Diego had continued talking. 

“Eight weeks,” Klaus rolled his eyes. 

“Eight glorious weeks of bliss,” Diego reminisced. 

Yeah, that’s what Klaus thought. It was Frank who told him one of his siblings had pushed him down the stairs, after he woke up in the infirmary. Klaus had never had any reason to doubt Frank before, so he’d instantly believed him. Even if it wasn’t true, at this point it didn’t really matter anymore. That wasn’t the only instance of their childhood where his siblings had acted like complete assholes, and ultimately he was glad Frank had helped prevent him from getting too attached. 

Speaking of - Klaus felt Frank’s presence, far closer than he expected. 

“Hey, just drop me off here,” Klaus interrupted whatever his brother might have thought to say next, more interested in seeing what Frank was up to than listening to that drivel. He could catch up to him once he was finished here… He could just summon the lady cop to tell him where Diego was. 

They came to a stop in front of a VFW, and Klaus eyed the building. What the hell was Frank doing, hanging around a VFW? And Ben too, he realized, now that he was closer. 

He made his way into the building, instantly spotting the two against one of the wall memorials. Frank looked vindictive, Ben seemed distraught. They weren’t the only ghosts in the building, each vet had their own cadre, but they were the only two he cared about. 

He strode through the building and reached the two of them before they even noticed him. 

“You see? He’s gone forever,” Frank was saying, one hand clenched tightly around Ben’s wrist. 

“Who is?” he asked quietly but confidently - no need to look crazier than he otherwise should. 

Both of them whirled to look at him with wildly different expressions. 

“You… survived,” was the first thing Frank said to him. 

“You’re alive!” Ben sounded happier to see him than he ever had before. 

He ignored both of them, his gaze focused on the display behind them. Sky Soldiers, the board proclaimed, their insignia hanging there in a place of honor. And - oh. It was his squad. They were posing together proudly, and Klaus remembered when this was. It was right after they’d gotten their tattoos. He and Dave were there, in the back. They’d been holding hands when the picture was taken. 

“You thought Vietnam would kill me? Did you forget that I literally can’t die?” he asked without taking his eyes off Dave’s face. “You taught me too well for something as silly as a war to end me. Is this where you came, every time you left? Making sure things still happened the way you wanted them to?” Of all of the pictures of all of the squads to wind up on a memorial board for the 173rd… Did one of his squadmates leave it here? Did one of them live in the city? 

“And yet you’re still weak,” Frank smirked. 

“What are you two talking about?” Ben asked. They both ignored him. 

“Because I didn’t immediately get rid of you? I needed you, I’ll admit. Without you, I wouldn’t have grown into my powers. But now I’ve gotten everything I could out of you. Want to see a new trick I learned while I was away?” 

Klaus had enough practice from all the Commission goons that reaching for this aspect of his power was easy now. Easier than shoving someone through the barrier by far. And moving on to the afterlife was far too pleasant an ending for Frank, even if he did wind up in Hell. Instead, he gripped the slimy remains of the man’s soul, and began slowly tearing it apart at the seams. Frank looked confused at first, and then almost immediately began screaming. Klaus took his time, stretching and pulling, little rips forming at first, growing into deeper tears. 

Ben watched on in horror. “What are you doing?”

“Isn’t this what you wanted, Ben? You were always trying to get me away from Frank, to push him away. Well, watch this!” With a final twist of his wrist, Frank’s form dissolved into little scraps, which fell apart before their eyes. 

“What did you _do_?” Ben sounded aghast. 

Klaus was distracted from responding by a hand landing on his shoulder. Oh look, Diego followed him. Looks like he wouldn’t have to do any catching up after all. 

“Let’s have this conversation outside. Don’t want to cause a scene, do you?” he glanced at both his brothers, before pushing past the guy he was sure was about to confront him for being there. Klaus would love a fight right now, but not with people he respected far more than his siblings. 

He ignored every word thrown his way until they were outside the bar again. 

“What was that all about?” Diego demanded once he saw he had Klaus’ attention again. 

“Just some unfinished business,” Klaus shrugged, moving towards the car. 

“Unfinished business… What unfinished business do you have in a veteran bar?” his brother scoffed. 

“What kind do you think?” Klaus rolled his eyes. “You do remember what my power is, don’t you?” (His brother had entirely ignored the insignia on his collar, and the dog tags around his neck. What a surprise. His brothers continue to live down to his expectations.)

Diego laughed at him. “Please. We all know you haven’t been able to conjure anyone in years.” 

Klaus looked between Ben and the cop, then back at Diego. “Right. Whatever. Come on, let’s go.” 

He got into the car, waiting for Diego to do the same. “You’ve got to stop putting that shit in your body,” he said as he started the car. 

Klaus just laughed, and then went back to ignoring Diego. 

“Were you really in Vietnam?” Ben asked from the backseat. He and the cop had remained silent through Diego’s whole fit. 

Klaus glanced back at them, then nodded briefly before going back to ignoring them. 

Ripping Frank apart for what he’d done had felt good initially, but he wished the high of it had lasted longer. It wasn’t even that he was feeling sad about it - he’d felt genuine love now, and knew that nothing Frank had provided came close - but it wasn’t the victorious sensation he’d expected. Maybe he’d get more out of Hazel and Cha-Cha’s deaths. 

(He knew deep down he wouldn’t feel whole again until he saw Dave. It made him consider using the briefcase to yank him out of the timeline, but he wasn’t sure how realistic that would be. If he grabbed him pre-Vietnam, then he wouldn’t know Klaus yet, and he wouldn’t love him. During the war would present a completely different set of difficulties, like managing to stay out of sight from his own past self, and what his past self would do if he noticed Dave was missing… He’d have to have a long conversation with Five about how he could successfully change things… A living Dave would be a million times better than anything Klaus could do with his powers.)

“What’s going on with you, huh?” Diego broke the silence. 

Klaus realized they were parked, and had been for quite some time now, right by Griddy’s Doughnuts. 

“I’ve never seen you like this before,” Ben added. “Why are you acting like this?” 

“Come on, tell me,” Diego spoke over Ben. 

He was fed up with both of them. If he didn’t need to make sure Diego didn’t ruin things, he’d have already left. 

“Because I lost someone, okay! The _only_ person who I’ve ever loved more than myself.” 

Ben’s jaw dropped, even as Diego stared at him. 

“Well, you’re luckier than most. When you lose someone, at least you can see them whenever you want.” The cop looked extremely sad at that statement. 

It’s not all it’s cracked up to be, Klaus didn’t respond. But now he also knew what Diego’s care was about. He thought if Klaus “got clean” he could help him see his girlfriend again. 

“That’s our man,” Diego pointed, and Klaus looked out to see Hazel getting into a blue car. 

“You're going after Hazel and Cha-Cha?” he asked, as though he didn’t already know the answer. 

“How could you possibly know that?” 

Klaus laughed. “They tortured me for hours. I barely got out.” 

What Diego should have taken from that was that he should wait and come up with something better than just following the assassin. Instead, he said “we gotta get this guy,” and started tailing him. 

Great. Maybe he’d get lucky and Five will have already done whatever he needed to do to see the Handler again. 

What followed was a disaster he absolutely predicted. Diego got himself shot, Klaus got to drive (an ice cream truck of all things!), Luther and Five had a botched showdown with Hazel and Cha-Cha, Five vanished (hopefully to go wage his attack on the Commission), and they left Hazel and Cha-Cha still alive in order to run away back to the house. Fucking ridiculous (almost as ridiculous as Diego’s if-I-die-go-get-help speech, but he wasn’t sure anything could top that. Both Ben and the cop had looked outraged). 

Now, he was back in his bedroom, reclined on his bed, and facing a Ben who was still dramatically demanding answers. 

After ignoring him for a while, Klaus finally rolled his eyes and sat up. Fine. He starts with being kidnapped (and learns Frank had managed to restrain Ben to prevent him from helping… the thought makes him laugh. Number Six held down by a simple civilian. Hilarious), and his subsequent trip to the Vietnam War where he soldiered with people who showed up the Academy on every level. He didn’t get choked up when talking about Dave, but he also didn’t go too into depth. Ben didn’t deserve the details. He might have remained by his side all these years, but it wasn’t out of brotherly love. He hadn’t thought that before, and spending so many months with his brothers in the 173rd had just confirmed it for him. He does talk about getting revenge for Dave’s death and enjoys the way it makes Ben pale drastically. 

“Oh just wait, Benny. I’m not finished yet. I still have to stop the apocalypse before my revenge is through.”

“Is this really what he would want?” Ben had the audacity to ask. 

“Dave knew who I was, Ben. He knows me far better than you, and he accepted every single part of me. Don’t you dare try to tell me what he would want.” He narrowed his eyes at his constant stalker. “You almost sound as though you don’t _want_ me to help our family stop the end of everything. Is that what you’re saying? You want it all to burn?”

“No! I just - there must be a better way! Killing people isn’t the answer!” Ben threw his hands up in the air. 

“Sometimes it’s the only answer, but people are too weak for it. Luckily we both know I’m not. Now, we both know Luther is going to call a family meeting tomorrow, and if you want to take part in it, you’re going to have to follow some ground rules.” 

“You’re going to manifest me for it?” his brother looked shocked. 

“I’m going to need to make a point about my powers. You’re just convenient. If you don’t agree to my terms, I can choose someone else,” Klaus shrugged. 

“What do you want from me?” Ben sounded resigned. 

Klaus smirked. Tomorrow would be fun. The whole family, back together again. And this time, Klaus wouldn’t be hiding anything. Well, okay, he wouldn’t tell them the whole truth. But he’d tell them enough. He couldn’t wait to see their reactions. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is mostly filler (sorry), but had to happen before I could get to the whole major family drama meeting.  
> Most the dialogue was taken directly from the show.  
> See you in a few days for the continuation!


	7. Chapter 7

**_Chapter 7_ **

When Luther finally burst into his room to declare “family meeting,” Klaus had already been awake for several hours. (Scheming never sleeps!) (Okay, scheming sometimes sleeps, but never for very long.)

Ben had been nagging at him all morning, trying to figure out his whole plan and also trying to change his mind. When he decided that wouldn’t work, he progressed to asking more questions about his time travel excursion, about the 173rd, about Dave. Klaus was about five minutes from using his powers to shut Ben up, when he finally asked a question that Klaus was willing to answer. 

“Back at the bar… What did you do to Frank?” Ben sounded scared, and slightly sick. 

“Why Ben, I thought that’d be obvious! I tore his soul apart!” 

“But how? Why?” 

“All this time, you’ve been trying to convince me to get rid of him! I’ve finally done it! Aren’t you happy? Aren’t you pleased?” Klaus jumped off his bed and approached where his brother was leaning against his shelves. “The whole time you’ve been with me it’s always been ‘don’t listen to Frank, Klaus,’ ‘why don’t we go do something else, Klaus,’ ‘you really need to stop this, Klaus.’ Nattering in my ear about how horrible of an influence he is… Well, now neither of us will ever see him again.” 

“I wanted you to stop abusing your powers like that!” Ben cried out. “To actually do something good for once, instead of following the path he wanted! You could be doing so much better! And then what you did to him… it felt…  _ wrong _ ,” Ben let out a shudder. 

“Of course it felt wrong to you. You’re just a shade, Ben. One of the many dead who never managed to move on. Up until now, if I wanted to be permanently rid of a spirit, my only choice was shoving them through the Veil. Getting the dead to leave when they’re so preoccupied with their ‘unfinished business’ isn’t the easiest thing, but it got them off this plane of existence. Now I know that isn’t necessary. Death is my domain, I should’ve known I could grant a more permanent death as well. You - you’re just another of the lingering dead. You  _ should _ be terrified of what I could do to you.” He engaged his powers of corporeality for just a split second, so he could pat his brother on the cheek. 

“Why did you do that to him?” Ben asked again, still sounding unnerved. “You never explained.” 

Klaus rolled his eyes, turning away again. “That’s because I don’t have to explain myself to anyone, least of all you.” He tilted his head to the side and thought about it for a moment, and then shrugged. It’s not like it was a huge secret, he might as well share. “Frank is a massive asshole, we both knew that. The difference is you hated that he was an ass and I delighted in it. He’s been there ever since I was a kid. The first ghost that wasn’t a screaming maniac, but just a regular maniac. He taught me things, taught me a new way of looking at things. He’s the one that taught me how to use my powers, not Reggie. I always thought it was weird that he wasn’t like the rest of the dead - even you were crazy when you first showed up, remember? Didn’t realize why he was different until I was sent back in time. He was already dead, but it was the first time I met him. I was the one who restored his sanity, and I told him enough about our lives and my powers that he chose to seek me out as a child. But he didn’t create me, I created myself by letting him go even though I knew what he’d do. He made the mistake of forgetting that. It’s true that without him I’d be a weak, addle-minded, drug addict, but now I’ve outgrown him. And as he taught me - always take revenge. He aided in my kidnapping, he’s been using me this whole time, so I destroyed him.” 

He didn’t need to go into detail about the malignant spirit thing. Ben didn’t need to know what lengths he was truly willing to go to in order to avoid being weak. To avoid winding up like the sad sap in the Commission’s files, who’d been homeless the whole time he’d been gone from the Academy, who’d never grown into his potential, who still bowed to the whims of his worthless family. 

“Along with everything else, Frank was always a massive narcissist. I’m sure he didn’t really expect me to return from Vietnam, which was truly stupid of him, but he probably also had an idea of how it would go. I’d approach him with tears in my eyes, ask him how he did it, why he did it, was everything truly a lie? And he could go into his prepared villain’s monologue about how he’d known from the start that I was useless and worthless, and so very easy to manipulate. He would become the focus of my attention again, the focus of my world and my agony, and he could laugh and indulge in it, he’d reveal all the ways he’s screwed me over, over the years. And in the end, I’d be too weak to do anything about it, and he’d swan off to go bother some other miserable asshole. Or, even if I took action against him, the worst I could do is send him to the next plane of existence, where he could continue laughing at me from the beyond.

“That was  _ his  _ plan. I know him well enough to know that. So I didn’t give him the satisfaction. I can guarantee he’d be completely pissed that I didn’t even give him the opportunity to get a word in. I could have drawn it out, could have made destroying him last hours or days, but really that would only have fed into his ego even more and given him a sense of importance he didn’t truly deserve. Being treated as worthless was a far greater punishment than any torture I could have devised.” 

Ben didn’t get a chance to respond to that before Luther interrupted their little heart-to-heart. 

Klaus dutifully trudged downstairs, Ben following at his heels as always. He hadn’t spoken again after Luther left, but he was clearly excited. He remembered Klaus’ promise - a chance to speak to his family again. He didn’t know why Ben was looking forward to talking to those assholes so much, but then, they’d always liked Ben more than him. So long as Ben remembered the ground rules it would work out. No sharing more information than Klaus offered, and definitely no personal details. He could confirm that Klaus was telling the truth, but he couldn’t offer more information. He definitely couldn’t talk about what Klaus had been doing all these years, and if he so much as tried, he’d be incorporeal before he could even blink. In fact, if he said anything at all that Klaus didn’t like, he’d be invisible again. (They had a bet going on about what Luther would do if he found out about Klaus’ source of income. Klaus was pretty sure Luther would either kill him (again, although he left that unspoken) or try to lock him up. Ben said his brother would never do something like that to a sibling. Klaus just laughed.)

They made their way into the living room where only a few days ago they’d been discussing their father’s funeral, and then whether to turn off Grace. The others were mostly gathered already, the only ones missing were Five and Vanya. Five was presumably with the Commission still, but Vanya… she definitely needed to be here for this, or it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun. 

As soon as Klaus entered the room, Luther attempted to begin. 

“The world’s ending in three days,” he started. 

“Three days?” Allison responded in disbelief. 

“That’s what Five said,” he agreed. 

“Yeah, that’s great and all, but you really shouldn’t start a family meeting until the family’s all here,” Klaus interrupted. 

“Five is missing again. We  _ are _ all here. Now-” Luther continued dismissively. 

“Actually, I was talking about Vanya. You know, our other sister. She should be here for this,” Klaus interrupted him. 

“This is an Academy matter. She isn’t part of the Academy.” 

“Really? Only, a second ago you called it a family matter,” Klaus smirked. 

“I’ll fill her in afterward,” Allison contributed. 

“Wow. I thought you were trying to  _ repair _ your relationship, be a better sister, all that jazz. ‘Fill her in afterward,’ you’re hilarious. That’ll just make it more clear you don’t think of her as worthy to be a part of the meeting. Rub it in her face that you were here and she wasn’t even invited.” Klaus knew that it wasn’t Luther he needed to convince, but Allison. Luckily she was easy. “Didn’t you say something about no longer excluding her?” 

Allison paused for a moment, then finally sighed. “As much as I hate to say it, Klaus is right. We should wait for Vanya.” 

“And how long is that going to take? We need to start this meeting, now!” Luther grumbled. 

Which, that was the exact wrong thing to say, and Allison was in defensive-sister-mode now. “You didn’t even call her like the rest of us! At least let me phone her!” 

Luther was never able to say no to Allison, even when she wasn’t using her powers, and it didn’t take him long to acquiesce. Allison went for the phone in the hallway, and returned a few moments later. 

“She didn’t answer, but I left her a message, let her know we were meeting and that we want her here.” 

“Fine. Can we get started now? As I said, Five mentioned the apocalypse.”

“Yeah, but can we trust him? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Five’s a little,” Allison made a whirling motion with her finger. 

“Our little psycho,” Klaus smirked. 

“He was pretty convincing,” Luther stated. “If he wasn't trying to stop an apocalypse, those lunatics wouldn't be chasing him.”

“That's why they were after him?” Diego questioned, looking worse for the wear after yesterday. He had a sling on the arm that had gotten shot. 

“Yeah,” Luther nodded.

“What did Five even see?” Allison asked, leaning closer to Luther. 

“Uh... Apparently, we all fought together against whoever was responsible.” Luther sounded extremely hesitant and was definitely leaving something out. Klaus was pretty sure he knew what. “Okay. So, here's the plan. We go through Dad's research-”

Allison was the one to cut him off this time, “wait, what?”

“Hold on, hold on,” Diego added.

“Wait a tick, wait a tick, wait a tick,” Klaus contributed to the protests, looking forward to seeing how Luther would handle the protests. “What actually happened the first time around?”

“Yeah. What are you not telling us?” Diego picked up the line of questioning, just as Klaus knew he would. “Come on, big boy, spit it out.”

There was silence for several moments, before Luther finally answered. “We died.” 

“What was that?” Allison asked. Luther had moved far enough away from her before he answered that she probably hadn’t managed to hear him clearly. 

“I said, uh, we died.”

As the others started to immediately ask more questions and demand answers, Klaus turned his head to the second story. The nanny ghosts were getting irritable. Vanya must be in the house. Wonderful. The real meeting could start very soon. 

He remained in the periphery of the conversation as Vanya found her way to the sitting room, and curiously, she wasn’t alone. 

“Hey,” Vanya finally gathered the others’ attention, but Klaus was more interested in the guy next to her. There were a few different ghosts following him, but two were the most obvious. One was clearly the guy’s father, and he was ranting angrily about how ‘Harold had always been a bastard, first he’d killed his mom, and then he’d killed him, his father. He should have drowned him when he was just a child, should have taken him out when he had the chance.’ The other was still Harold’s, but she was circling Vanya, saying she hadn’t needed to get her boyfriend to kill her if she wanted first chair so badly, did the conversation in the dressing room piss her off so badly?

“It’s a family matter,” Allison finally responded, eyeing the interloper.

“A family matter,” Vanya scoffed. “So you couldn’t bother to include me?”

“No, it’s not like that, we were-” Luther tried and failed to handle things, as usual. 

“Don’t let me interrupt,” Vanya turned to leave, and Allison moved towards her quickly. 

“Wait, we tried to call. You didn’t answer your phone. This is important, and we want you here. Maybe… not Leonard, though.”

“You called?” Vanya sounded shocked. 

“I told you… it’s a family matter. And you’re family. But it’s also time sensitive. We couldn’t wait any longer.” 

“Wait, who is Leonard?” Klaus asked. 

Vanya looked away from Allison for a moment, then back. “Leonard is my boyfriend. Leonard, these are my siblings.” she motioned between the guy and the rest of them. 

“I hate to be the one to tell you this, but his name definitely isn’t Leonard. It’s Harold,” Klaus shrugged. “At least, that’s what his ghosties are saying. Killed your own father? Nasty business.”

“What are you talking about?” Luther demanded in his Leader Voice, and the others also looked sort of appalled. 

“I’m talking about the ghosts following him around. His victims.” 

“Stop making things up!” Vanya said in a startlingly loud voice. “We all know you haven’t been able to use your powers since you got into drugs!” 

“Yes, convenient, that. Everyone knows so it must be true, so no one thinks to question it. It’s been useful all these years, but it’s kind of pointless now, with the apocalypse coming and all,” Klaus smirked. 

“What are you saying, that you’ve just pretended to be an addict this whole time?” Luther snorted. “Yeah, right.” 

“None of you have even seen me since I left this place. Why do you think you know who I am? And anyways. If I didn’t have control of my powers, would I be able to do this?” With a twist of his hands, and a blue flash, Ben was suddenly visible to the whole room, not just him. He had been leaning against the counter where the others were gathered, trying to feel like part of the conversation even though he was a step separate from it. Diego was the first to notice him. 

“B-B-Ben?” his voice cracked along with the stutter, a sure sign Diego was feeling extra emotional. 

“They can see me now?” Ben asked Klaus, who nodded even though the answer was obviously yes. 

“Oh my God, Ben!” the others immediately crowded around him, reaching out to touch him, to make sure he was real. Klaus on the other hand, made a ‘go on’ motion at his sibling. Go on. Fulfill your purpose here. 

“Klaus was telling the truth. He probably has better control over his power than any of you do. And that guy Vanya is with does have dead people following him, and they’re calling him Harold.” 

Vanya reached out a hand, gripping Ben, then turned back to look at her boyfriend. “What are they talking about, Leonard?” 

The guy held up his arms in a defensive position, but was clearly stalling, thinking up some excuse she would believe. They were all interrupted by a flash of blue light that didn’t come from Klaus this time. 

Five thudded down onto the table, clutching a briefcase. He was dirty and obviously had been fighting, still panting from the exertion.    
“Jesus!” Allison exclaimed, throwing herself backwards. 

“Five! And just in time, too. We were holding a family meeting,” Klaus smirked. “And now all of us are here.” 

Five groaned and rolled off the table onto the floor, Luther and Allison reaching out to catch him. 

“Five, where have you been?” came from Luther (he definitely hadn’t developed any better bedside manners in recent years). 

“Are you alright?” came from Allison (who clearly had). 

“Who did this to you?” Luther asked, catching on that his first response hadn’t been the best one (who said an old dog couldn’t learn new tricks?). 

“Irrelevant,” Five responded, grabbing what remained of Allison’s coffee and chugging it while everyone watched with varying degrees of interest. 

“So the apocalypse is in three days,” Five began, turning to face the group, but then he broke off. “Ben?”

“Hi Five, it’s good to see you,” Ben smiled shyly. 

“What, how are -” Five looked around the room again, then back at Ben. “How are you here?” 

“That would be me,” Klaus smiled, waving his Hello hand at Five. “As I was saying just before you jumped in, I’m not a drug addict, and I do have control of my powers. Anyways, you were saying, about the apocalypse? That’s what this meeting was supposed to be about, how we’re going to stop it.” 

“I was,” Five stopped again taking a deep breath. “The only chance we have to save our world is, well, us.” 

“The Umbrella Academy,” Luther sounded smug, even as Vanya frowned. 

“Yes, but with me obviously. And to give us a fighting chance to see next week, I've come back with a lead. I know who's responsible for the apocalypse. This is who we have to stop,” he handed Allison a slip of paper. 

“Harold Jenkins?” Allison asked. 

Klaus burst out laughing. Vanya’s boyfriend, who had been slowly trying to edge out of the room while they were all distracted (first by Ben, then by Five), froze at the sound of his name. 

“Who the hell is Harold Jenkins?”

“I don’t know, yet,” Five tossed the coffee cup aside before turning to where Klaus was laughing. “I’m sorry, is this funny to you?”

“Oh it’s hilarious. What are the odds that the guy who starts the apocalypse is in this very room?” He pointed at the man in question. “Vanya’s boyfriend is the trigger for Five’s apocalypse!” 

Five doesn’t hesitate, immediately flashing over to the man and shoving him against a wall. 

“Wait! That can’t be true! Tell them it isn’t true!” Vanya cried out, also moving towards her boyfriend. 

“I told you already, he lied about his name. And according to Jenkins Senior over there, this is exactly who we’re looking for,” Klaus nodded. 

“They’re lying, please Vanya, you know me!” Harold pressed against Five’s grip, but was no match for the trained assassin. 

Ben moved closer to Vanya, carefully grabbing her hand. “I’m sorry Van, he’s telling the truth. That really is Harold Jenkins. I can see his dad too.” 

“Was it all a lie, then? Why me? Why did you - you’ve been manipulating me?” Vanya demanded, sounding more distraught than Klaus had heard her in years. 

“No, that’s not true,” the guy immediately stuttered out, then groaned as Five thrust something sharp at him. 

“Tell the truth. What’s your real name?” Five sounded somewhat deranged, but he supposed having the thing he’d been desperately searching for all this time right in front of him would do that to anyone. 

“Come now, Harold, no need to lie when we already know the truth. You saw me materialize Ben, do you want me to bring your dad into this conversation too? He’s pretty pissed about the hammer, would love the opportunity to return the favor.” Klaus grinned at the man, and saw him pale. 

“Okay, yes, fine. I changed my name. I didn’t want to be connected to him anymore! Harold Jenkins, he’s… a lonely boy. An outsider whose family was cruel to him. All he ever wanted was to be heard, to be loved.” 

“Allison was right about you all along,” Vanya backed away from him, while Allison moved forwards, reaching for Vanya. 

“Which leads to the question, why Vanya?” Five demanded. Harold groaned as Five drew blood. “What did you want with her?”

Harold wasn’t very smart, so he just shook his head, refusing to answer. His father had no such compunctions. 

“According to Jenkins Senior, he was obsessed with us as a kid. Had all the action figures and comics, even built himself a little costume. He wanted to be us. And then he killed his dad and got sent to prison, and now he just wants to destroy us. He thought Vanya would be the easiest way in after he read her book - thought since she’d been pushed to the side too that she could be his foot in the door,” Klaus contributed. “Did you think we wouldn’t find out, Harold? You thought  _ you  _ could destroy  _ us _ ? That’s hilarious.”

“What are we going to do with him?” Diego asked. 

“We could turn him into the police,” Luther suggested. 

“On what grounds? He hasn’t done anything yet,” Allison looked at them. 

“But we know he’s going to! Five could get proof,” Luther sounded stubborn on the point. 

“They don’t arrest people for crimes they  _ might _ commit, Luther,” Diego rolled his eyes.

“We could just kill him,” Klaus suggested. 

Luther immediately protested, “we don’t do that!”

Klaus scoffed, nearly laughing again. “Don’t do that! How many people did the Academy kill, when we went out on missions? ‘Well those were just bad guys, enemies, they don’t count,’” he mimicked Luther. “Well apparently, this guy is going to cause the apocalypse and kill billions. Pretty sure that’s the kind of thing that gets someone the death sentence.”

“I… agree,” Diego said. “We don’t know exactly how he’s going to cause it, just that it’s him. Better safe than sorry.” 

“No, we are not doing this,” Luther protested. “Allison?” 

“He’s going to start the apocalypse… kill everyone. Kill Claire,” she sounded apologetic as she looked at Luther. 

“No! I forbid it, I’m Number One!” 

“Well, luckily I don’t need your permission,” Five responded, even as Harold’s body hit the ground. Vanya let out something which might have been an aborted sob, clinging more tightly to Ben and Allison. Harold’s spirits dissipated, their unfinished business fulfilled, even as Harold’s stepped out of his body. 

Harold’s ghost saw Klaus watching him, and rushed forwards, obviously pulling back an arm to try to hit him. Klaus laughed, both at him and at Luther’s statement, and pushed Harold away even as he turned to look at Luther. “No one cares about the numbers anymore except you, Luther. And really we should talk about that, next. I have some news you’ll all definitely want to hear.” 

Five knelt over Harold’s body, and there was a weird squelching sound for a few moments, before something was tossed on the floor. Then Five grabbed his fake eyeball and shoved it into the now-empty socket. Diego looked like he wanted to throw up, even as Five grinned. 

“Same eye color, same pupil size. Guys, this is it. The eye I’ve been carrying around for decades has found its rightful home. We got the guy we needed to kill to stop the apocalypse,” Five looked more youthful with that one smile than in the entirety of the time since he’d come back. 

Klaus had thought that with the official end of the apocalypse, he would feel more victorious, but he was still kind of empty. Well, there were still Hazel and Cha-Cha to take care of. It wouldn’t be truly over for him until their deaths. 

“Right. As I was saying,” Klaus continued. “There are a few more things we should talk about at this family meeting, since we’re all here.” 

“I’m not done talking about what just happened!” Luther sounded angry now, which was always fun. 

“I conjured Dad,” Klaus said the thing he knew would immediately drain the wind from those sails, and he was right. 

“What? When? Can you bring him here now, like Ben?” Luther was very forceful, taking a few menacing steps forward. 

“When? Doesn’t matter. Could I do it again? Sure. But why would I want to? He was a Grade A asshole and I’m glad he’s gone. But there are a few Hargreeves family secrets which should come out now. And trust me, you’ll want to take a seat.” 

Five had zapped over to the bar, and seemed to be mixing margaritas. He was clearly still in party mode. Ben and Allison seemed to still be comforting Vanya, but all three looked up at his words. 

“What did the old man have to say?” Diego was the first to ask. 

“There’s no easy way to say this, so I’m going to just spit it out.” 

“This is a bad idea,” Ben contributed, then looked slightly shocked when everyone looked his way. Seems he’d forgotten he was visible. Klaus would have to keep an eye on that. 

“Anyways. I summoned Dad, and he gave me the usual lecture about my appearance and my failures in life, yadda yadda yadda. No surprise there. Even the afterlife couldn't soften a hardass like Dad, right? But he did mention something about his murder, or lack thereof, because...he killed himself.”

“I don’t have time for your games, Klaus,” Luther looked angry again. 

“I’m not lying. It’s the honest truth. Ben was there,” he pointed, and Ben nodded. 

“Why’d he do it, then?” Five asked, sipping on something green. 

“Because he was a complete idiot who apparently didn’t know how to work a phone,” Klaus laughed. “He said it was the only way to get us all together again.” 

“No way,” Diego’s expression mirrored Luther’s. 

“No. Dad wouldn’t just kill himself,” Luther was still in denial. 

“You said it yourself,” Five contributed, “he was depressed. Holed up in his office day and night.” 

“No. There weren't any signs. Suicidal people exhibit certain tendencies, strange behaviors,” Luther started listing. 

“Like sending someone to the moon for no reason?” Klaus snorted. “Oh, yeah, and there’s that. Apparently Diego was right all along. There was no mission on the moon, no research he needed done. He just wanted to be rid of you. He never even looked at all the stuff you sent back.” 

“You’re wrong,” Luther protested. 

“Unfortunately,” Pogo interrupted, suddenly entering the room, “Master Klaus is right on both counts.” Pogo was studiously ignoring the body on the floor to face the group. “Regretfully...I helped Master Hargreeves enact his plan.”

“What?” Luther sounded aghast.

“So did Grace. It was a difficult choice for both of us. More difficult than you could ever know. Prior to your father's death, Grace's programming was adjusted so that she was incapable of administering first aid on that fateful night.”

“Sick bastard,” there was a lot of vitriol in Diego’s tone, but then, he’d always been closest to the robot. 

“So the security tape?” Allison asked. 

“It was meant to further the murder mystery. Your father hoped that being back here, solving it together, would reignite your desire to be a team again,” Pogo revealed. 

“And to what end?” 

“To save the world, of course,” Pogo sighed. 

“Well, we’ve already gotten that over with,” Klaus pointed towards Harold’s body. 

“And the moon mission?” Luther wasn’t done. “‘Watch for threats,’ that’s what he told me. And then the apocalypse… Surely it had something to do with my research on the moon!”

“Your father was many things. Forthright was not one of them,” Pogo at least had the decency to sound apologetic. “After your accident, he wanted to give you purpose, Master Luther. He felt that was the only way.”

“What? Shanghaiing me on the Moon for four years? I wasn't a good enough Number One? That's what it was? I couldn't cut it? So he sent me away?” Luther went from angry to distraught very quickly, Pogo’s words having an impact that Klaus’ hadn’t managed (maybe it was the fact they came from a trusted source?). Allison left Vanya to Ben, and moved over to give Luther comfort instead. 

Klaus watched all of this in amusement, even as the others all had their own reactions, and then spoke again. “But wait, there’s more!”

“What else could there possibly be?” (Which is more important than me and what I just learned, Luther didn’t add. But they all heard it.)

“This secret isn’t for you, Gorilla Boy, but for our dear sister Vanya. Dad was hiding a lot of things, but I think this is probably the biggest.” (He’d conveniently leave out the alien thing. They wouldn’t believe it anyways so there was no point.)

“What?” Vanya asked. 

“Well. Forty-three kids born in mysterious circumstances, and only one of them doesn’t have special powers? Does that sound very likely to you?” Klaus asked. 

“What are you saying?” 

Ben looked like he wanted to protest, to get Klaus to do things differently, but he also knew his current position here was contingent on not ruining Klaus’ fun. He’d been a very good boy so far, remaining quiet and everything. Maybe he’d actually make it to the end of the meeting. 

“Vanya, you have powers. You’ve always had powers. But you were more powerful than the rest of us, and you knew it. You wouldn’t let Dad control you, so Reggie decided you shouldn’t be allowed to keep them. They locked you up in a tiny room under the house and drugged you until you could no longer access your powers. They told you it was for your anxiety, but technically it was for theirs. He was scared of you, of what he couldn’t control.”

“No,” Vanya was crying, “What? How… Why? I’ve had powers all this time? I was special, like the rest of you? Why would he do that?” 

There was an odd rumbling in the house, as Vanya continued to vent her emotions, like something was shifting the foundations. It sounded like there was rain pouring outside the windows, but Klaus knew it had been completely dry only a few moments ago. Huh. 

“Oh my god,” Allison suddenly froze. “I understand now. When we were four, Dad told us you were sick. You had to be isolated. We were so young...None of us knew to question it. But then he asked me to do something I never understood... until now. He made me an accomplice.” 

“You did this to me?” Vanya sounded as though her voice was coming through a tunnel. 

Bad timing, Allison. Really. Choosing to give her a different outlet for her anger, to provide herself as an outlet? Not very smart. 

“You knew this whole time?” Vanya yelled, and it was like the ground was shaking. She had brushed Ben off and was now directly facing Allison. 

“No, no! I didn't really understand! Until today, until he told us!” 

“Well, now it all makes sense. This is why you never wanted me around,” Vanya scoffed. 

“What? No!” Allison was still protesting. Luther stepped up behind her, rested a hand on Allison’s shoulder, but that just made things worse. Made it clear it was them against her. Klaus watched with glowing glee, hoping to see Vanya kick Luther’s ass. That would certainly be a sight to see. 

“You couldn't risk me threatening your place in the house, your - your dominance!”

“That is not true.” 

“You couldn't handle the fact that Dad might find me special!” Seems she’d already forgotten that it was their father who’d ordered the rumoring in the first place. Again, good job, Allison, giving her a new outlet. 

“You are special, with or without powers.” Allison looked as though she wanted to reach out, to touch her sister. Klaus could have told her that was a bad idea. Ben looked terrified, but Five looked intrigued. Of course he would. He probably wanted to know what she could do. Diego, too, looked incredibly interested. It looked like neither had really noticed that Vanya’s powers were already acting up (he honestly hadn’t really planned on that, but hey, it just made things more interesting!)

“We have a chance to start over,” Allison was saying. 

“You destroyed my life!”

“Oh, please, Vanya. Everything is out in the open. We can move on!” Wow, Allison. No people skills whatsoever, apparently. 

Vanya thought the same, and it looked like something was beginning to flicker under her skin, and a breeze was starting to kick up around the room. 

As that happened, it became clear to the rest of the Academy what was happening, or rather, that Vanya was happening. 

Pogo actually looked rather terrified. Funny. He should. He helped suppress her powers in the first place. If Klaus were her, he’d be one of her first targets. 

“Are you okay?” Allison wasn’t the only one to ask, the others approaching them. 

“Leave me alone!” Vanya yelled, and then it wasn’t just a ripple under her skin, but the entirety of her body. She was bathed in a white shine, and the subtle rumbling of the house turned into something almost equivalent to an earthquake. 

“Miss Vanya! Stop this at once!” Pogo shouted, even as he braced himself. “I understand how upset you are. But I can assure you that none of your siblings bear any responsibility for what happened to you as a child.”

Everything went deceptively still as Vanya turned to look at Pogo. Klaus noticed her eyes had changed, were some kind of creepy white-blue. Cool. 

“Did you know?” 

“Your father discovered that you were capable of great things. Much like your brothers and sister. But your powers were too great. He only wanted to protect you from yourself. As well as your siblings.” 

Wow, Pogo. Apparently he’s where Allison got her communication skills from. 

“Did. You. Know?” Vanya demanded again. Klaus thought that answer was pretty self explanatory, but he figured she wanted a direct answer as opposed to the waffling mess she’d just gotten. 

“Yes, Miss Vanya, I knew.” 

Vanya screamed then, and Klaus was somewhat surprised when he was thrown backwards along with everyone else. 

It looked like Vanya’s power was overloading her, like she couldn’t control it. The light under her skin was building, building… 

Klaus reached out with his telekinesis and found that he was fighting something for control… He was fighting  _ Vanya _ for control. Her power had wormed its way through every inch of the Academy… the whole building was being held together by her right now, and the moment her power became too much for her, it would collapse. 

Klaus strained against her, and while it seemed Vanya had significantly more raw power at her disposal, Klaus was much better trained. It felt like for every inch he took, he was prying away at a tightly clenched fist, but Klaus had never been a quitter. He grit his teeth, stretched out his hands, and held tightly to the building. 

And then- 

A wave of power exploded out of Vanya, throwing everyone and everything back. Klaus managed to maintain his grip on the house itself, but all the contents of the rooms were too much. With Vanya’s grip gone, Klaus alone was the only thing holding the house together. He’d probably just saved all of their lives. 

Vanya was on the floor, crying, and the others seemed at least moderately okay, some bruising the worst damage done. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Vanya was saying, over and over again. Ben was the first one to make it to her side, to start reassuring her. Allison wasn’t far behind. 

“What the hell was that?” Luther demanded as he pulled himself to his feet. Allison shot him a dirty look over her shoulder. 

“I’d say that was Vanya’s powers, obviously,” Diego also stood. Five pulled himself up from behind the counter of the bar. 

Klaus remained on one knee, his arms raised, balancing the weight of the building. He wasn’t really sure where to go from here… If he let go, they’d all die, himself included. While he would probably survive that, being buried under tons of concrete definitely wouldn’t be a great way to go, and he’d have to actually be dug out for his survival to mean anything. But he also couldn’t stay like this forever… He was strong, sure, but this was an entire city block. He could already feel the fringes of the building start to fall apart. Which, whatever, that was definitely less important than the part of the building they were all in, but it also wasn’t a good sign. He would need the others to get him out of here. Could he trust them with that? (He couldn’t trust them at all.)

“That’s not what I meant. You knew this would happen?” Luther whirled on Klaus, and either didn’t notice or didn’t care about his physical state. 

“Well, not this exactly, no,” Klaus managed to force the words out. “I knew she had powers, I didn’t know she was off her pills. I figured the worst that could happen would be a few ripples. Instead she nearly took the building down.” 

Luther stomped towards Klaus, and he was pretty sure he knew what was going to happen before the others did. He’d made a promise that he wouldn’t let Luther throw him around again, but to stop Luther, he’d have to let go, and if he let go… 

“Luther, stop! I’m warning you! I’m the only thing keeping this building from collapsing!”

Luther either didn’t care or didn’t believe him, because he still grabbed Klaus around the neck and slammed him against the closest surface. 

“Luther, he isn’t lying, let go of him!” Ben jumped to his feet. 

Klaus was impressed he managed to hold onto the Academy even with heavy gorilla hands around his throat. 

“Luther, stop,” Klaus gasped out, but he couldn’t grab at the hands, and the next thing he knew - 

-

-

-

-

Klaus opened his eyes in a grayscale world, and screamed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :)


	8. Chapter 8

**_Chapter 8_ **

“Luther, I’m going to fucking kill you this time.”

Klaus looked at the stupid gray road, and the stupid gray trees, and the ridiculous gray sky. Fucking Hell. (Well, Heaven.)

Where were They? 

Almost as if summoned by the thought, a bell rang, and Klaus turned to see a bicycle coming his way. Great. So this time, God was an ethnically ambiguous little girl on a bike. She took Her sweet time, finally coming to a stop right in front of him. 

“Almost didn't see you. Keep on riding around here. So pale and all. They don't have any sun down there?”

“Yeah, yeah, I could use a tan. Hurry up, kick me out, I have a brother to murder.” Klaus stopped being amused by these encounters after his third death. 

The girl frowned, and at first he thought She was just annoyed he wasn’t playing along this time - he was supposed to ask where he was - but then She shook Her head. “You’ve upset the balance.” 

“Upset the balance? What does that even mean?” This was new… interesting. He still didn’t want to linger, though. With his luck, his siblings would abandon his dead body in the wreckage of the house, and he’d have to dig his way out. The longer he remained buried the more difficult and painful it would be.

“You’ve abused your powers in ways you shouldn’t have.” 

“Well then maybe you shouldn’t have given them to me,” Klaus scoffed. Abused his powers? What had he done differently since the last time he died? He’d been using his powers to exploit others for over a decade… Oh. He’d discovered his ability to destroy souls. He guessed that might be the kind of thing that could piss God off. Still. She was the one who gave him the power. 

As if reading his mind, She shook Her head again. “I’m not the one that provided that one. There’s a balance.” Hadn’t She claimed to create him? If not Her, then who?

Klaus rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you mentioned. Could you hurry this up? As I said, I have places to be, and I’m sure you do too. The next part goes, ‘I don’t like you, you can’t stay here.’” 

“You need to stop before you break something that can’t be fixed,” She ignored his suggestion. 

“I’ll keep that in mind. Now vite! Are we done here?” 

The frown grew deeper. “Time is flying, so hurry up. He’s waiting,” She pointed, and the movement felt very definitive, his attention immediately drawn to the ramshackle building that hadn’t been present previously. He felt the sudden urge to rush towards it, almost like a compulsion. 

He shook his head, having to work to pull his attention back to Her. 

“No, I don’t think so. There’s no one you have that I want to talk to right now,” Klaus refused. 

She looked very surprised at the rejection. She expected him to just cooperate. How cute. He didn’t have time for this though. 

“You need to-” She started. 

“No,  _ you _ need to. You need to send me back.” Klaus was getting frustrated and annoyed now. Neither of them truly wanted him here, and they both knew he wouldn’t stay. He’d had enough of this dog and pony show. He didn’t know who was waiting in that building. It could be anyone from his father to Dave, but he had different reasons for not wanting to talk to either of them at the moment. Whatever it was She thought was going to happen here, he wasn’t going to go along with it. 

The two stared at each other for a moment, and Klaus was startled to hear leaves rustling in the trees. There was a breeze blowing through the area, and it was picking up speed. If this were Earth, that wouldn’t be too strange, but in all his visits to Her domain, the weather had never once changed or altered. Everything he encountered had always been still, like stepping into a photo, other than Her. 

“Stop it,” the Girl nearly shouted. 

Oh. “That’s not you doing that, that’s me.” That was a statement, not a question. He just knew it was true. Every time he was here, She seemed perfectly in control, it was Her domain. Except. God was Creation. This was the realm of the Dead. This was Klaus’ domain. 

The wind grew stronger, the flowers in the little basket on the front of the bike starting to lose their petals. 

“It was never you, was it? You showed up, you started this loop, just so I wouldn’t notice.” He hadn’t even considered that it was weird to be personally greeted and then kicked out each time. Of course he would be, he was important! There was his ego getting in the way. And Klaus had never visited at full power before. Every time he had died, Frank had been with him. Now he was ten months without the leech, and stronger than usual. And emotional - his power was always stronger when he was emotional, and he was so very angry right now (he wanted to destroy Luther… it wouldn’t be the smartest immediate move, but it would be oh so gratifying). Dirt and twigs began to be swept up into the air, miniature twisters circling the area. God looked as though She wanted to step in, to do something, but now they both were aware that She couldn’t. She was just a visitor in this place as well. “It was never Heaven and Hell, just the Realm of the Dead. They’re all here, I can feel it now,” Klaus smiled at her, an expression he was sure was a touch manic. Because he  _ could _ feel it, so much stronger than he ever had before. This was where he pulled his power from, he knew that. His control of the dead, his ability to move things without touching them, and even to rip apart souls. The barrier had never felt more open to him. 

“Wait!” She cried out, but Klaus had already  _ p _ **r** e _ s _ **s** e _ d _ \- 

  
  


“-  _ killed _ our brother!” 

“It was an accident!” 

His hearing came back first, and Klaus could hear fragments of an argument. It sounded as though the voices were right above him. 

“That makes it even worse! How could you!” That was Diego. 

“He started this, it was his fault!” Ah, Luther. Justifying his actions. 

“He  _ saved _ us! And you  _ killed _ him!” Wow, Vanya sounded genuinely upset. Being off her pills must be good for her. 

“I came back to save all of you,” Five sounded so very cold and hard. 

“I didn’t know that-”

“That what?” Klaus coughed as he forced the words out. Damn his throat was sore. “That grabbing someone by the neck and throwing them around would snap someone’s neck? How convenient.” He gasped a few times, struggling to draw in breath. 

Every eye turned towards him immediately. 

“K-Kl-Klaus! You - You… You were dead!” Diego immediately dropped to his side. His eyes were red, and his face was still covered in tears. Huh. 

Five also invaded his space. “How? I felt your pulse. There wasn’t one. You were dead.” 

Klaus laughed, or did his best to. “You think that’s the first time Luther has ‘accidentally’ killed me?” he put air quotes around the word, and tossed in an added dose of venom. He took in another breath, pressing his hands to the sides of his neck. Someone had straightened his neck for him, which was convenient. It meant the lingering injury was now closer to a dislocation rather than broken bones. A quick glance around showed they were definitely not at the mansion. Although he didn’t recognize the room, a violin stand made it pretty clear this had to be Vanya’s place. He had been left on a couch, and everyone else was crowded into the cramped living room, except Allison. He hadn’t heard or seen her. Ben was sitting on a counter across the room. He was the only one not currently freaking out, although he did look surprised about the Luther comment. Of course. He hadn’t been there for Klaus’ first death, and he and Frank had never bothered to inform him. 

“What does that mean?” Diego sounded enraged on Klaus’ behalf. Curious. 

“What do you think it means? Luther tends to lose control of his strength around me. Has ever since we were kids. Broken bones and bruises, and on a particularly memorable occasion, he pushed me into a table and my skull cracked open. I found out the hard way that I can’t stay dead as part of my powers,” he massaged his throat as he talked, trying to at least minimize the pain. This definitely wasn’t a fun way to go, but it wasn’t as bad as the bullet to the head. It was better than strangulation too, because that had crushed all the delicate parts of his neck, and it was swollen for weeks. 

“That didn’t happen,” Luther sounded petulant. “I would have noticed.” 

Klaus shook his head at Luther’s stupidity and then winced. Bad idea. Diego moved closer, resting a hand on his shoulder. He looked worried. “It was the day I left. I noticed they replaced the table. Probably couldn’t get all the blood out. Mom was the one who put my head back together. She could tell you.” 

Everyone was silent for a moment, and then Luther finally spoke. “After the house came down, we couldn’t find Mom. Or Pogo.” 

“Allison got hit pretty bad by some falling debris, and we weren’t sure - Ben, did he - is he…?” Vanya sounded hesitant again, all her energy vanishing with her anger. 

Summoning and using his power over the dead was always easier after he’d passed through the Veil himself, so he figured instead of a verbal answer he could grant them another visual. He stretched out ‘Hello,’ and suddenly all the ghosts in the room were corporeal. Oops. He definitely hadn’t meant to do that. He had reached for a trickle and instead received a flood. 

There was a brief pause, and then several gasps. The first was from Diego, who noticed his lady cop and ignored all the guys with knife wounds. Then Vanya, staring at Five’s swarm (they definitely had the most interesting injuries of the bunch). Five merely stared back with a hard look in his eyes. Luther’s ghosts had a variety of broken bones, and he actually looked uncomfortable with the sight. (Could he be taught? Klaus had his doubts - the bruises around his throat said otherwise.) Harold had been ranting in the corner, but looked up at the commotion and grinned, diving for the group. There was a scream from the apartment next door, and several very loud thuds from the apartment above. 

“Ah, shit.” Klaus released his power immediately, and the dead returned to intangible, just in time for Harold to pass through him. So it hadn’t just been this room, but maybe the entire building? How far out had his reach just spread?

“What was that?” Luther demanded, the first to recover. “Where did they all come from? Where did they go?” 

“They’re all still here, I’m just the only one who can see them,” Klaus rolled his eyes. “And who do you think they were? Those are the people you’ve killed. They follow you around and demand revenge. Most murder victims do. Patch over there was special,” Klaus waved a hand to where she was lingering next to Diego (her name came to him instinctively now that he reached for it, like most of the dead), “she followed our brother instead of her killers. And Ben, of course, chose to follow me around. Most who linger do so because of unfinished business.” 

“Why did you do that? Make all of them visible?” Luther was still using his Number One voice, and Klaus  _ really _ wanted to punch him in the face. (The rest couldn't blame him for that, could they? He was the victim here, a punch was the  _ least _ he was entitled to!)

“I didn’t mean to, obviously. I was reaching for Ben. But I just  _ died _ so sorry if my control is a little disjointed,” Klaus scowled, turning the attention back to Mr. I’m-the-Leader. 

He closed his eyes, ignoring whatever else was said, and reached for his connection to the Veil. Where before Veil had been an accurate name, a thin sheet separating him from the dead, now it was an open archway. No wonder everything was so much stronger. He’d been reaching through a sieve for years, but now his true potential had been unlocked. This was what God had been trying to prevent, all those times She encountered him after his deaths. She had made it so he didn’t think to reach, and so when he shot back into his body, he thought it was Her doing, rather than a tether pulling him back. He had entirely broken down the barrier between this realm and the next. 

He hesitantly reached again, looking for just the barest pinprick, and received the trickle he had expected the first time. Ben and Patch popped into existence for the others, and Klaus strained to ensure they were the only two. It would be easier to just shove all the other ghosts away so he didn’t accidentally materialize any others… Well, fuck it. Might as well rebuild his barrier while he was doing this. He reached out to familiarize himself with Patch and Ben, and then  _ shoved _ at everything not-them. He overshot it again, could feel himself using too much power, and the wave that left him stretched much further out than he had planned. He remembered thinking only earlier this week that pushing his barrier to cover a whole block of the city would just be an excessive waste of his power, and now he’d done it by accident. He almost wanted to laugh. He didn’t even feel slightly drained. Then he paused and thought of the downsides of this boost. He was going to have to relearn his powers all over again. Shit. 

He opened his eyes again, and saw that the room had fallen completely silent, every eye turned his direction. 

“What?” 

“You were glowing,” Ben supplied, and the others didn’t even turn in his direction, although he knew Ben was definitely corporeal. 

“Glowing?” his voice sounded skeptical. 

“Similar to how Vanya did, before the house fell apart.” 

“Hmm. Well, this has been fun, but I’m going to leave now. If I have to look at Luther for one more minute, I’m going to tear his tiny head from those gorilla shoulders,” Klaus stood up, only swaying slightly. He might not be weakened from his powers, but his body was still very unhappy. 

“We’re not done talking yet!” Luther cried out, face turning an interesting shade of red. 

“What is there left to talk about? You are a dick, Vanya has powers, I have powers, we all have powers, thank you, goodbye.” 

“She destroyed the house! She hurt Allison and probably killed Pogo and Mom. She’s dangerous. She needs to be contained.” 

Klaus snorted again, and noticed there was a distinct absence of comments from the peanut gallery (usually Diego was the first to leap into a fight with Luther, but he looked spooked, his attention mostly on Patch, who was whispering quietly to him). Fine. This needed to be done, and it looked like he was going to need to be the one to do it. “ _ You  _ destroyed the house. I had everything under control, right up until you  _ actually _ killed me.  _ You _ are dangerous. She just learned she has powers, and hasn’t even had a chance to learn control. You’ve known yours for all these years and want us to believe my death was an accident? What if it had been Diego? Or Five? They wouldn’t have come back, and I’d have one more ghost in my entourage.  _ You _ are dangerous. Maybe you’re the one who needs to be contained.” 

Luther looked disturbed by his comments, and looked for support in a room that was wholly against him. “You said Dad was scared of her, that he locked her up to protect everyone from her!” 

Klaus gave a smile that was all teeth. “And he sent you to the moon, to keep you away from everyone. I wonder what that says about you, Luther. You didn’t get a secret room in the basement, you got sent 200,000 miles away from every living human.” 

“Five said-” “Don’t bring me into this.” “-that the mansion came down just like it did in the apocalypse. That means she is what destroys everything. We can’t let that happen.” 

“You’re so fucking obtuse it makes my brain hurt. Fine.” Klaus threw his hands in the air. “I already know that the apocalypse won’t happen, because the Temps Commission has been destroyed. There are no more people out there, secretly manipulating events to make it happen. The only loose ends left are Hazel and Cha-Cha, and I plan to take care of them, too.” 

“How could you know that?” Five demanded. 

“What do you mean, ‘too’?” Diego questioned. 

Klaus let out a heavy sigh. What to tell them… “They had their headquarters in the 50’s. Every single one of them died in the 50’s. After you left, Five, someone showed up and wiped them out. I guess they ‘corrected’ the wrong person, and someone showed up for revenge. The dead are my domain. They aren’t able to lie to me. So when you showed up with your groupies, I started pulling at ghosts with knowledge of the Commission. More so after Hazel and Cha-Cha kidnapped me. There were a few with more information than most, some woman who called herself the Handler, and the apocalypse case handler, Dot. I learned everything they knew about the apocalypse. If we do nothing, then it’s done. Over with. No death of everything. But if Luther gets his way, then there’s still a chance. If there were agents to send, they’d be here already, trying to set Vanya off to convince us all that he’s right. She wasn’t even supposed to have her first real explosion of power yet. I told her early, expecting the pills to still be in her system. I didn’t realize that crazy guy stole her pills when he recognized they were antipsychotics instead of the anxiety medication she said they were.” He paused there and turned to look at his (officially, now that he was ten months older) little sister. “You really should have gone to an independent doctor instead of trusting something our father’s been giving you for years. We all knew he was a horrible person, but the stuff he was giving you was truly messed up. You probably shouldn’t quit cold turkey. Find a good doctor and wean yourself off. Anyways. Questions?” 

There was an explosion of noise in response, and Klaus rolled his eyes. He preferred it when he had been on his own. In LA, he didn't have to answer to anyone about anything. Sure, both Ben and Frank had tried to influence his actions, but they knew he was the one in charge. Luther was so obsessed with being Number One that he expected everyone to follow his lead all of the time, and everyone was so over Luther being Number One that they often just did what they were told. Usually Diego’s inferiority complex could be counted on for a good fight or two, and Five had always been an arrogant shit, but they had been oddly quiet since he had woken up. He didn’t think he’d ever heard that specific tremor in Five’s voice, when he mentioned checking Klaus’ pulse. 

And that was really the crux of it… they had witnessed Klaus die, so now they were all convinced that they cared about him again. A case of the ‘don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone.’ He hoped it would blow over quickly. 

“Why don’t you all go fuss over Allison for a while? I’m tired. Everything else can wait until tomorrow.” 

Five’s eyes narrowed even further, and Klaus could practically see the equations streaming behind his eyes. 

As expected, Luther almost immediately left the room. It was occasionally a toss up as to what was more important to him, Allison or being the leader, but an injured Allison would always win out in the end. 

“I know it isn’t much, but you can have the couch, Klaus. Allison is in my bed,” Vanya sounded quiet and drained again. He missed the confidence from earlier, the fact that she had yelled at both Allison and Luther. Then again, she had also just found out that her powers could cause the apocalypse, so he’d give this to her. 

“That’s alright Van. I don’t want to stay that close to Luther. I’ll get a hotel room or something.” 

“Where are you going to get money for a hotel room?” Diego snorted, finally looking up again. “Just stay here with the rest of us.” 

“I know none of you think very highly of me, but I do have my own money. I haven’t been living on the streets, or constantly high, or whatever else you thought. I made something of myself while I was gone,” Klaus rolled his eyes. “Don’t worry. I’m sure I can maintain Patch here even if I’m elsewhere.” 

Diego immediately stood, turning his back on his girlfriend for the first time that night. “Hey, you know that’s not my concern, right? I’m worried about you. About my brother. You were  _ dead, _ Klaus. I carried you all the way here, and you were cold in my arms. I thought you were gone forever. I don’t want to lose any more of our family.” 

Klaus wanted to believe him, he really, really did. But he knew what brotherhood felt like, and he’d never gotten it from the others in the Academy. There was no reason for that to change now. He did appreciate that Diego had been the one to bring him with them, though. If it were left to Luther, he was sure he’d still be digging his way out of the rubble now. 

“I’ll go with him,” Five stood too. “I’m sure between the two of us, we can handle any problems. Vanya’s apartment is feeling a little too cramped for me right now.” 

Klaus glared at Five for a moment. He didn’t  _ want _ Five dogging his steps. He was pretty sure Five knew that he was planning to hunt down the last loose ends in this whole thing. Then again, this had been Five’s quest long before it became his. And he used to do what those two did. He’d probably have an idea of a starting point. “Fine. I’m sure we can find somewhere for two. Ben, you can stay here. Just remember what we talked about.” 

Klaus moved towards the door, and was surprised when Diego’s arms wrapped around him. 

“Be careful, bro. Those freaks who shot up the house are still out there. I don’t care if you don’t stay dead. Don’t take any risks.” 

“We’re just going to a hotel,” Klaus awkwardly patted his brother’s back. He couldn’t remember the last time Diego had been physically affectionate towards him. 

Diego stepped back only to be almost immediately replaced by Vanya’s much smaller frame. “Thank you,” she said in her soft voice. “For telling me the truth, and for protecting me. For not letting Luther do anything to me.” 

“If he tries anything while we’re gone, tell Ben and he’ll come get me. Luther’s not laying a hand on you.” He feels like he’d made it pretty clear doing so would start the apocalypse, but Luther’s skull had always been thicker than average. Hopefully Allison would wake up soon - she’d always owned all of Luther’s brain cells. He didn’t know exactly how bad she was hurt, and didn’t particularly care, but it couldn’t be too bad or they’d have taken her to the hospital instead of Vanya’s apartment. 

“I’m sorry we didn’t do anything to stop him,” she had tears in her eyes when she pulled back. “It all just happened so fast, and then everything was falling apart, and… I’m sorry.” 

“It’s Luther,” Klaus responded, shaking his head. “There was nothing you could’ve done. Next time, I’ll be ready.” 

“Next time?” she sounded tentative again. If she was going to get a handle on her powers, she would need to learn to be much more confident. To have faith in herself. They could work on that later. 

“It’s Luther,” Klaus repeated, nodding. “Anyways. We’ll come back in the morning. Sleep well, Vanya. Diego.” 

Five says his goodbyes as well, and they finally leave the apartment. Klaus breathes a sigh of relief, not even bothering to contain it next to Five. 

They walked in silence for several streets, before Five finally spoke. 

“So.  _ Someone _ took out the Commission?” He said it in a very pointed tone. 

“Yup.” 

“Any idea who it could’ve been?” 

“A few.” 

“You gonna share?”

“Mmm.” 

Five stopped him, pulling him into an alleyway. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

“What makes you say that?” Klaus reclined against the brick wall, staring at his older brother. 

Five snorted. “I’m not an idiot like the others. ‘I’ll take care of them, too.’ You weren’t even trying to hide it.” 

Klaus shrugged. “The others didn’t notice.” 

“As I said.” 

“They killed someone important to me, so I destroyed them,” Klaus admitted, shrugging. “I got there right after you left. The chaos definitely helped me do what was needed.” 

“So you knew I was going to make it back there before I even contacted the Handler. You knew it would be taken care of by the time I made it back for the family meeting… How did you know I would make it back for the family meeting?” 

“Logical deduction. I knew when you left, and there’s no way you would waste time when you still thought the apocalypse was incoming. I knew about Harold before you made it back with the name. If you hadn’t managed to come back with something important, I’d have found a different way to get rid of him. And I knew Vanya still needed to be triggered, so I made it happen. As I said before, I didn’t think it would be quite so big, but you can’t plan for everything. If her outburst happened in the wrong circumstances, there’s nothing Luther would stop at to lock her up. It’s actually more convenient the mansion is already gone, because that means the room in the basement is gone too. No more nuclear Vanya.” he spread his hands wide, as though revealing a grand plan. Maybe it was a grand plan. He wasn’t supposed to die during it, but it’d turned out alright in the end. It had given him this shiny new upgrade to work with. “The only remaining loose ends are Hazel and Cha-Cha. I assume you know where they are? Or should I get one of their victims to tell us?” 

Five was staring at the pavement as though it was particularly interesting, and he remained like that for several moments until finally he looked back up. “Did you figure out why they did it? Why they needed the apocalypse to happen? She - the Handler - implied that there was a greater purpose behind it.” 

Klaus pondered for a few moments, whether Five would believe him or not, whether he would take him seriously, but he hadn’t ridiculed him yet. “Intergalactic politics. The Earth is going to be prime real estate at some point, but comes with the pesky limitation of current inhabitants. But if those inhabitants were wiped out in a convenient disaster… there’s nothing to stop certain parties from auctioning off the planet.” 

Five’s jaw dropped open as he took that in. “Alien politics?” 

“Alien politics,” Klaus confirmed. “Speaking of. Dad was secretly an alien. Probably how he knew the disaster was coming in the first place, he just forgot to get all the facts first.” 

“Reginald Hargreeves was an alien…” Five trailed off. “Well, I suppose that makes sense. We always did say he couldn’t experience human emotions.” He chuckled then, and looked slightly surprised at the sound, before laughing even louder. Klaus joined him. It was genuinely ridiculous. He knew that the people who had sponsored the Temps Aeternalis were still out there and he might need to step in again at some point, but their current operations on Earth were over, and he knew to keep an eye out now. Fucking aliens. 

Five gathered himself up, and looked as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. “While I had access to the tube room, I sent Hazel and Cha-Cha messages saying they should kill the other. They’ve probably turned on each other by this point, we just need to figure out where they’ve gone.” 

“I hope they haven’t gotten too far yet. Cha-Cha’s  _ mine _ .” 

“Fair enough,” Five responded, and led the way to the motel where they had last been camped out. 

Huh. Maybe not all of his siblings were that bad after all. Then again, he had mentioned that Five was his favorite just by virtue of not being around for so long. He’d been away even longer by his perspective, time to grow up and grow away from the Academy. The distance had definitely been for the better. He wouldn’t have been able to share this much with any of his other siblings without fear of retaliation. 

Maybe things were starting to look up. 

About time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Vite" is French for quickly/fast
> 
> This is NOT the last chapter.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is out later than most of my past chapters! It is REALLY easy to lose track of time in quarantine!   
> Also, if you ever wonder why I try to avoid writing dialogue in my chapters, this one will definitely tell you why. Sorry in advance for how dialogue heavy it got lol

**_Chapter 9_ **

Five had been one of the Commission assassins not too long ago, and had sent Hazel and Cha-Cha new marching orders even more recently, so he led the way to the motel he was sure they had been staying at. Even if they weren’t still there, it was a starting point. (It would be faster to grab one of their victims for questioning, but Klaus wasn’t in a rush.) 

Fortune Smiles Motel was as much of a shithole as the hotel they’d brought Klaus to, so he wasn’t particularly surprised this was where they’d wound up. The Commission clearly didn’t value their worker bees (Hazel had spent more than enough time whining about it...Well, he wouldn’t have anything to complain about for much longer). 

Five skipped the front desk and without hesitation walked straight to one of the rooms. He stopped at the door, and then motioned for Klaus to go ahead. It was interesting Five didn’t just jump inside and open the door himself, but he supposed Five was looking for another display of Klaus’ power. Fine. 

Klaus reached for the door, intending to just undo the lock with his telekinesis. Instead, the whole door flew off its hinges and into the room. Hmm. He really needed to get a handle on this. Oh, well. A dramatic entrance was always enjoyable in its own right. Five gave him a raised eyebrow, but Klaus just smirked at him, as though he’d done exactly as he’d intended. 

A female voice began swearing immediately, but there was a distinct lack of gunshots. 

They moved into the room, and Klaus burst out laughing. Hazel was nowhere to be seen, but Cha-Cha was handcuffed to the radiator, pulling uselessly at the chain. 

“Trouble in paradise?” he questioned. 

“Where’s your partner?” Five asked. 

After swearing a few more times, Cha-Cha finally stopped struggling and turned to face them. “He’s gone. And once I take care of you two, I’m going to find him and kill him too.”

“You take care of us? Don’t make me laugh,” Klaus almost couldn’t believe how delusional she was. Almost. “So he’s the one who got the jump on you? Why didn’t he just kill you?” 

This time, instead of answering, she just glared at them. Right, well, there was an easy fix for that. 

“If we just kill her now, she won’t be able to ignore my questions. It’ll be easier and quicker than torture,” he glanced at Five. (He’d never really enjoyed torture anyways...it just felt kind of pointless. He might not have very strong morals, but there were easier ways to get information even if a little quid pro quo wouldn’t be out of place in this instance.)

“What do you mean?” 

“The dead can’t refuse a question from me. I told you that before.”

Five made a thoughtful sound, then nodded. “Fine.” 

“You little shit. You might have gotten your contract cleared once, but they’re going to open it up again. It’ll be open season on you! If I don’t kill you, someone else will. They always get you in the end… Not even you can stop them,” Cha-Cha spat the words out, pulling at the chain again. 

“You haven’t heard? I’ve already taken care of the Commission. They’re gone, and now you are too.” Klaus raised a hand at her. Snapping her neck like he had most of the people at Commission headquarters would be the easiest and most convenient way for her to die, but when he engaged his powers, her spine came flying out of her throat with a disgusting snap and squelch. He wasn’t entirely certain whether that was an unconscious desire that won out or another instance of his powers reacting more strongly than he’d anticipated, but he also didn’t really care. Five stared at him with a completely dumbfounded expression, and Klaus found himself shrugging defensively. “They tortured me for almost twenty-four hours.” 

He let the gore-covered object fall to the ground next to its corpse, and they both watched Cha-Cha collapse and eventually drown in her own blood. The ghost which arrived very shortly after was almost funny to look at, hunched over at the waist, with her upper half entirely limp but still spewing venom. She looked ridiculous. Like most deformed dead however, she was still very much able to speak, and it didn’t take long to get the answers they wanted. 

“They did get your little notes, but ultimately decided not to kill each other. Except then Hazel decided he was in love with that doughnut lady and wanted to quit the Commission. Cha-Cha here didn’t take the news too well, but he was too much of a wimp to follow through with offing her,” Klaus explained. 

“He’s done with the Commission? Really?” 

“According to her,” he waved a hand at the corpse. “She was going to hunt them down after she got out of here. He hasn’t been gone for very long. We should be able to catch up pretty easily.” 

“If he’s left the Commission and the apocalypse is already over, then what’s the point?” Five asked, turning to leave the room. 

“The point, mon frère, is revenge,” Klaus ripped Cha-Cha’s spirit apart, tired of listening to her insults no matter how creative she got. She definitely didn’t deserve a place in the afterlife, and destroying her soul entirely was a more long-term solution than just pushing her away from him. If she got the chance, she would definitely try to become a malignant spirit, and he’d had enough of those for a lifetime. “He’ll be on his way to Griddy’s now. We can probably get there before his little girlfriend does. Don’t you think it’ll be better for her to think she’s been stood up than to find his body?” 

Five’s face went unreadable for several moments, but he dutifully followed as Klaus led the way. “The person the Commission killed… they were really important to you, then?” 

“He’s the person who taught me what love was. The only person who has really, truly seen me and still loved me anyways,” Klaus responded, not stopping. 

“Is he here with you now?” 

“No.” Klaus didn’t bother explaining more. What would be the point? He hadn’t tried to contact Dave himself, but Dave also hadn’t come looking for him. He’d either passed fully on or he didn’t want to see Klaus. (And… well. He didn’t particularly want to see Dave as a ghost, either. It would make his death more… real. He didn’t want or need that.)

“This person…” Five trailed off, obviously searching for a name. 

“Dave.” 

“Dave,” Five repeated. “What did you like about him?” 

His first instinct was to say something shallow and glib, but he couldn’t follow through with that. Not for Dave. Klaus closed his eyes, remembering. “He was kind, and strong, and vulnerable, and… beautiful.  _ Beautiful _ .” He put everything he couldn’t verbalize into that word. There was just too much to Dave to put into a simple adjective. 

“And all this… Destroying the Commission, hunting down Hazel and Cha-Cha… you think he would want that? Would want to watch you do that in his memory?” 

Klaus whirled on his brother. “I already told you. He knew me better than anyone. And he didn’t love me in spite of it, he just loved me. If he hadn’t - if they hadn’t murdered him, I would have stayed in 1968 for him. Did you know that? I destroyed the briefcase which took me there. It was going to be me and him, for the rest of our lives. No more of this bullshit. And then they sent someone to kill him to get me back here. It was their briefcase I used to get back, not Hazel and Cha-Cha’s.” Hm. That briefcase had probably been destroyed when the mansion came down, along with Five’s. That was… disappointing. “You don’t know  _ anything _ , so unless the next words out of your mouth are an idea on how we could save him, then stop talking.” 

He hoped, wished, that Five would have an easy answer. That he would say that saving Dave would be simple. But he also knew better. They didn’t talk again before they reached the doughnut shop. 

Hazel’s beat up blue car was the only one in the parking lot. He was waiting patiently, but inattentively. He didn’t even see them coming. He died a lot more cleanly than Cha-Cha had, but his spirit went the same way as hers. 

  
  


By the time Klaus and Five reached a hotel which could be deemed worthy and was at least somewhat in Vanya’s neighborhood, Five was panting. Klaus wouldn’t have expected his brother to have such terrible stamina, but then, it’d been quite a few years. He was an old man, even if he didn’t look like it. His black credit card got them quick service, and Five didn’t even bother raising his eyebrows this time. He remained silent until they reached their two bed suite, but almost the moment the door closed behind them, he collapsed onto the floor. 

“Jesus, Five. What the fuck?” 

His only answer was a groan. 

Five was clutching at his side, so Klaus pushed his shirt up, and found torn stitches and a bullet wound. 

“When were you shot?” he demanded, immediately putting pressure on the wound. He reached with his telekinesis, knowing the layout of hotel rooms well enough to find a towel without trouble. Luckily, this time his power responded the way he wanted it to and he didn’t tear something else apart. 

“The Handler got a lucky shot in. We patched it up after getting to Vanya’s,” Five gasped out. 

Klaus snorted. “You are running around with a bullet wound, yet they thought you should be looking after me?” He put Five’s hand over the towel, and then searched the drawers of the room until he found the sewing kit. It wasn’t optimal for patching wounds, but Klaus had used similar kits on himself before, so it wasn’t too much of a concern. Five was just lucky they were staying at a hotel classy enough to provide a free sewing kit in each room. 

“They were preoccupied enough with Allison I’m sure they forgot,” Five groaned as Klaus stitched him back up. 

“Not a professional job, but it does what it’s supposed to. You should go clean all the blood off before you sleep. Careful of the stitching. We’ll get you a new shirt from the gift shop before we meet back up with the others,” Klaus tied a knot in the thread, then packed everything away again. 

“Of all our siblings, you’re the least like what I expected,” Five said the non sequitur from his place on the floor, no longer sounding nearly as pained or out of breath. 

“Yeah, well. All your information came from Vanya’s book. And while she might have gotten the others right, she didn’t know nearly enough to actually see me,” he turned his back on his brother and moved into the bathroom to clean the blood off his hands. (The visible blood, anyways.)

“Clearly,” Five’s voice came from much too close. He was leaning on the door frame, and he’d clearly teleported rather than walking the distance. “How did none of them notice? You remained at the Academy for years after I left… How did you keep your powers that much of a secret? Why?” 

“It was easier if they all thought I was worthless. Not even Dad cared enough to look closer, why would any of them? We weren’t ever truly siblings, Five. Vanya did get that part right. Just strangers in the same house. They all liked each other better than me anyways. I didn’t need the ghosts to tell me that, not that it stopped them.” 

Five’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

Klaus rolled his eyes. “The dead know more than the living, and they tell me things. Even when I don’t want to listen. Before I learned to push them away, to silence them myself, they’d scream, and cry, and wail. They’d say terrible, awful things. The dead are spiteful, Five. They hate the living. They go insane over time, lose track of their humanity the longer that they’re on this plane of existence. They knew I was the only one who could hear them, so they swarmed to me, like moths to the only light in existence. I tried ignoring them for a while, but Reggie never allowed that. When I finally did start listening, I learned more than he could ever have taught me. I had a mentor among the dead, and he’s who got me to really see the Academy for what it was. To see the world for what it was. He thought I was stupid for caring about you guys, so he told me the kinds of things you’d all say behind my back. Helped free me of that weakness.” 

Five looked thoughtful. “If you knew their purpose was spite, that they wanted you to hate us, how could you ever trust anything they said?” 

Klaus rolled his eyes. “Even if I couldn’t force the truth from them, things were pretty clear after the stairs incident.” He stepped away from the sink now that his hands were clean, brushing past Five to go back into the main room. He threw himself back on the bed, enjoying the relief for a moment (he was still extremely sore from his recent death), before pushing himself up onto his elbows so he could see Five again. 

Five was still leaning against the doorway, but had turned so he was facing Klaus. “The stairs incident?” He was quiet for a moment. “You mean when you fell down the stairs?”

“When I was pushed, Fivey,” Klaus clarified. “Not that anyone owned up to it. I wouldn’t have known if Frank hadn’t told me, although he never specified which of you it was.” 

“Klaus, none of us could have done it,” Five sounded serious. 

Klaus rolled his eyes. “Yes, because you’re all such upstanding citizens.” 

“No, because none of us were even home at the time. It was a long time ago, even longer for me, but I remember… Father was on a business trip, and Pogo was busy, so we decided to sneak out to Griddy’s. We were planning on inviting you, but no one knew where you were, and you had seemed to be pulling away from us for a while at that point, so we decided to just go without you. When we got home, you’d already fallen. We all felt so guilty that you had gotten hurt while the rest of us were out laughing and eating donuts, that we didn’t ever go back to Griddy’s before I time traveled. None of us were in the house when you fell, Klaus. I don’t know who Frank is, but he lied to you.” 

Klaus had already considered that Frank might have lied about several things to make him listen, and had even considered this instance in particular after Diego had brought it up, but hearing Five explain… “It doesn’t matter,” he said definitively. “You already were excluding me at that point, as you yourself just pointed out. One thing that didn’t happen doesn’t make up for a lifetime of interactions.” 

“I think… I think that at tomorrow’s family meeting, we should all air out our lingering grievances, the hurts that have gone unsaid, and maybe finally move past all this and start being a family again.” 

“Being a family again? Who are you and where is Five the pragmatist? What, you thought you were going to come back and stop the apocalypse, and then we’d all sing kumbaya and magically become a family again?” Five didn’t respond, merely looking at the floor. “Oh my God, you did! You’re hilarious, bro. There’s no ‘becoming a family again,’ because we were never a family to begin with! I said that already. Go do whatever you want with the others, but once I’m sure the apocalypse is well and truly over with, I’m going back to my life, and as far away from those pricks as I can.” 

With that, Klaus turned away from his brother, yanked off his shoes, and pulled himself under the covers. His closed eyes should make it clear the conversation was over, and he heard the bathroom door close very shortly after. It took more time for the shower to finally start, but Klaus ignored that in favor of sleep. A family again. What a ridiculous idea. 

  
  


They made it back to Vanya’s apartment later than expected because Five slept in and Klaus had insisted on visiting the continental breakfast once he was finally up. They got Five a nice “I heart NY” shirt from the gift shop before they ate, not wanting to draw more attention than necessary. While Five was occupied with food, Klaus went to the front desk and had them extend his room booking for a full week. He wasn’t sure how much longer he’d actually remain in the city, but he wasn’t hurting for money and there’s no way he was going to stay with any of the others while he was still here. Vanya’s apartment was cramped and tiny, and the last he heard, Diego was living out of a boiler room. Luther had never had anything other than the Academy, and they all knew Allison had done her best to ignore the fact that she’d ever lived in this city. 

They took a taxi to Vanya’s as opposed to walking again, now that he knew Five was hiding a bullet wound. It wouldn’t do to have him open it again and cause a scene when they arrived. 

Well, more of a scene. The door had hardly opened at the sound of their knock when Luther started freaking out. 

“Where have you been?” 

“As we said last night, we got a hotel room instead of sleeping on the floor,” Klaus rolled his eyes at the display. He moved further into the room, and sat down in the only open chair, making sure to keep an eye on his particularly unkempt brother. Luther wasn’t looking so hot… It seemed he hadn’t slept at all, and he’d had plenty to think about overnight. 

“You should have stayed with the rest of us.” 

“In Vanya’s tiny apartment? There’s hardly room for her, let alone the rest of us. Allison probably has closets bigger than this,” he unconsciously mirrored the very thing Vanya had said mere days ago. 

Said sister was sharing the couch with Diego and Ben, all three of which looking extremely fed up with Luther. Allison was sitting in the only other chair, looking almost as pale as the time she was almost eaten by Dr. Terminal. She was nearly mummified in what must be Vanya’s entire supply of gauze and ace bandages. She had a notepad and marker in her hand, their purpose clear from the note on the top page (“SHUT UP LUTHER”) and it made him wonder what had happened to her voice, but he also didn’t particularly care. (If anything, he was relieved her ability to rumor was at least temporarily taken away.) Five also pushed his way past Luther and sat on the arm of the couch closest to Vanya. 

“Where’s the other one, Diego’s girlfriend?” Klaus asked. He was pretty sure she should still be here and solid, the way he’d left her. 

Diego scowled at that. “The police found my prints on her body, so they thought I’d killed her. They wanted to arrest me for her murder. She went to the station to tell them what really happened.” 

Klaus let out an incredulous huff at that. “What? She just casually strolled down to the police station, gushing blood from her chest, and did the whole ‘rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated,’ thing? That ought to go over well.” What the actual fuck. Not only had Klaus not had to use his power to restore her sanity, but she had the willpower to leave her purpose for lingering in order to make sure Diego came out of things okay? Patch must be one hell of a woman. 

“We haven’t heard from her since she left. I’m not sure how it went down,” Diego explained. 

“She wouldn’t let him go with her,” Vanya added. “He was very put out by it.” 

Klaus snorted. He was more surprised by Patch than he was by Diego’s response. He could tell that she was still corporeal, although not what she was doing. He wondered if the police would even accept her testimony about how she died. How could they possibly respond to the ghost of one of their officers? Why did she think that would go over well? Oh, to be a fly on that wall. He’d have to get the details from someone later. He was sure there were plenty of dead lingering around a police station, if he couldn’t get the details straight from Patch. 

“Well, they’ll find Hazel and Cha-Cha’s bodies at some point today, and their weapons should make it even more clear it wasn’t you. Don’t worry about it,” Klaus shrugged. 

“What do you mean?” Luther burst into things again, unable to not be involved. He was lurking awkwardly nearby, as there was definitely nowhere for him to sit. No one except him seemed bothered by that. But then, Luther always liked to look like he was in charge, he should be glad to be the only one standing!

“Exactly what I said. The temporal assassins are dead.” 

“How can you be sure?” 

Klaus rolled his eyes. “Have you forgotten I can see the dead? Their ghosts made it pretty evident.” 

“Well who killed them?” 

“What does it matter? The Commission’s last operatives are gone, we can all rest easy. You can rest easy, little bro,” he turned to Diego. “Patch’s killers are dead.” 

“We’re the same age,  _ bro _ ,” Diego snorted, although he did seem pleased to hear that. 

“Time travel,” Klaus waved a hand. “I’m ten months older than you all now. Well, except for Five, our favorite grandpa.” 

“When did you time travel?” Luther looked confused, and Allison seemed to agree, pointing at Luther as though it would add extra emphasis to the question. 

“When Hazel and Cha-Cha broke into the house, they kidnapped and tortured me for a day. When I escaped, I stole their time machine and accidentally activated it.” 

“You were kidnapped?” Vanya sounded aghast. 

“Why did it take you ten months to come back?” Diego already knew about the kidnapping and torture so he looked less surprised than the others. 

“Because I found something that was better than what I had here, obviously,” Klaus shrugged. “I stayed until I lost it.” 

“That woman you lost?” 

“ _ Man _ ,” Klaus corrected. “His name was Dave. He was murdered by the Commission to get me back here. So here I am.” 

There were more questions, and Klaus wanted to groan. “Looks like you’re getting your family heart-to-heart after all, Five. Why don’t we talk about Luther instead, and why he should learn to use his words instead of his fists.” 

“I already apologized for that,” Luther looked uncomfortable. 

Klaus shot him a look of complete disbelief. “No, actually, you didn’t. At least not to me! You know, the person you actually killed!” 

“You never said you were sorry, you just kept giving out excuses,” Diego confirmed. 

“Alright, fine. Klaus, I’m sorry that I accidentally killed you, but -” 

“There shouldn’t be any ‘buts’ in an apology, big guy,” Klaus sneered. “It just demonstrates you don’t actually mean it.” 

“I  _ am _ sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I felt like you had put the whole family at risk, and then everything happened so fast… I didn’t mean for you to die. I will be more careful in the future,” every word came out like Luther was being tortured into saying it. 

“Aw, baby’s first apology,” Klaus cooed. 

Every hint of regret immediately vanished from Luther’s posture as he jumped right back to righteous anger. 

“This is exactly why-”

“Luther!” Five’s sharp voice cut through Luther’s rage, and impressively, he immediately backed off again, shaking his head in disgust. 

“Exactly why you killed me, I know,” Klaus couldn’t help but add. 

“You shut up, too,” Five turned his way. “You’re not helping anything. It’s clear this family is extremely dysfunctional. We can’t fix anything while we’re like this. As Klaus suggested, I want us to actually have a real conversation. Clear the air,  _ without _ resorting to violence or immature commentary,” he looked pointedly between Luther and Klaus. Klaus stuck his tongue out in response. “We apparently managed to cause the apocalypse in the original timeline by being horrible siblings. Let’s help prevent it by  _ fixing _ that.” 

Klaus wanted to let out a groan as the rest of his siblings nodded along in agreement - even Ben looked enthused by the idea. 

“You guys can have fun with that, but I’m not doing it. I already told you Five, I don’t see us as a family. The rest of you can do what you like, but I’m out.” 

“You’re not going anywhere,” Luther ordered. “It’s a good idea, and you’re staying.” 

“You’re not in charge of me, Number One. I left for a reason, and that reason hasn’t changed.”

“Which is exactly why you  _ should _ do this,” Ben tossed out, the traitor. Klaus hissed at him. Ben had been trying to get him to talk to the others for years. 

“Please, Klaus,” Vanya spoke up. “I want you here for this. If my powers get out of control again… Well, after what happened at the mansion, you might be the only one capable of helping if I lose control again.” 

Klaus bared his teeth at all of them, but remained seated. “Fine,” he snapped out. Staying didn’t mean he needed to participate. “Go ahead, Vanya, air your grievances. Tell everyone how you really feel.” 

With all the sharing and crying which would follow, Klaus would soon find himself wishing that the apocalypse wasn’t just still on, but that it would happen a day early. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're almost at the end, now!   
> For those of you who've been hoping for something like this, well.... *jazz hands*


	10. Chapter 10

**_Chapter 10_ **

Klaus remained silent as Vanya whined and complained about always being left out of everything, about how all of them were terrible siblings to her, that she never felt included. She despaired that they all got private training while she was forced to the sidelines, a silent observer. Being left out of family portraits, he’d give her, because that was messed up, but the rest was all just petty. Five and Ben had always spent time with Vanya, more than with anyone else. Sure, Diego did his lone wolf thing, and Allison and Luther were constantly obsessed with each other over all else, but she wasn’t fully isolated other than when she herself was doing it because Daddy dearest instructed her to. She probably had more positive interaction with their siblings than Klaus had. 

The others (excluding Luther who, the longer it went on, awkwardly plopped himself onto the ground cross-legged in a production which took an excessive amount of time and energy) all cajoled her, coddled her. Diego made a formal production of forgiving her for writing her novel. Allison apologized for her role in hiding her powers all these years. Five reaffirmed that he’d always liked Vanya best. Ben talked about how much he had missed talking to her, all those years he’d been dead and out of contact. That he had occasionally separated from Klaus to go to her concerts and that he was so proud of her. 

Klaus remained silent, just observing. He clearly wasn’t looking for the same thing as the others. They wanted to become a family again (again? They’d never been a family to begin with), he just wanted to prevent the apocalypse. 

Vanya was finally winding down with her catharsis, and while there were a few prickles of her power while she vented her emotions, she managed to remain in control enough that Klaus had never needed to step in and take care of things. 

He figured with Vanya finally done, that would be the end of it. They could watch her for the rest of the day, attend her concert tomorrow, and then all disperse when the apocalypse never happened. Five didn’t seem as onboard with that plan. 

“Why don’t you go next, Klaus?” 

Every eye in the room turned to where he was slouched in his chair. 

“Pass. I don’t have anything I want to share with the group,” he waved a hand dismissively. “Why don’t you tell everyone about your problems instead? What was your mannequin girlfriend’s name again, Dorothy?” 

“You need to tell them what you told me, get it all out there,” Five insisted (deflected), and the others immediately looked more curious. 

Klaus scowled at the room, and shook his head. “I don’t  _ need _ to do anything. This is for all of you, I don’t care what happens after this. I plan to go my own way and never see any of you again once this is all over.” 

“What are you talking about? We’re working on rebuilding here,” came from Diego, shockingly. When had he suddenly become invested in the Academy again? 

Klaus snorted. “I wasn’t a true part of the clique to begin with. If you want to pick up where you all left off, go for it, but don’t include me in your plans. I’m out of the Academy, and I’m never coming back. I’m sure Vanya would love to take my old place on the team. You’ll still have a full set.” (Except for Ben, who couldn’t be corporeal without Klaus present, but he definitely wasn’t sticking around on Ben’s behalf.)

“You can’t just quit now,” Luther grumbled. 

“I didn’t quit now, I quit more than ten years ago. Keep up,” he rolled his eyes. The others all seemed excessively surprised by the fact that he had no intention of returning. Why? He’d made it clear from the start that he didn’t plan on sticking around. 

“What was Five talking about? What do you have to tell us?” Vanya asked. 

“None of your business!” 

“You should talk to them Klaus,” Ben spoke up, clearly feeling more confident to speak out when all his siblings were doing the same. Klaus hissed at him in warning. 

“Klaus told me that the dead told him we were all terrible siblings and did their best to make him hate us growing up. And it worked. He doesn’t think of us as true family,” Five contributed. 

“What?” rang out in several different voices, even as Klaus glared at Five. See if he ever shared anything with the little shit again after this. 

He ignored the increasingly fervent questioning for a moment, closing his eyes and letting it wash over him, before he finally stood up. “Fine. No, I don’t see any of you as actual siblings. And why should I? The girl who just spent ages saying she never felt close to us,” he motioned at Vanya, “the person who constantly used her power to shut me up and leave her alone,” he pointed at Allison, “the arrogant asshole who needs to learn to keep his mouth shut,” he glanced at Five, “the guy who has actually killed me  _ twice _ now,” he stabbed an accusatory finger towards Luther, accidentally putting enough power behind it that Luther scooted several inches backwards, “the ghost who only stuck around because I was the only one who could see him, and even then only ever criticized all my choices,” Ben looked away, “and the one who has just never really cared,” he had less to say about Diego, to the man’s own credit, but that wasn’t saying much in this room. “When have we  _ ever _ acted like family to each other? I experienced more brotherhood from strangers in the Vietnam War than I did from any of you - you, who never even noticed I’d been kidnapped or tortured. Even the assassins had more faith in you than I did, and it ended up being Diego’s girlfriend who noticed I was missing and came for me, not any of you!” he threw his hands in the air to emphasize his point, and most of the detritus in Vanya’s apartment lifted into the air. He scowled at his own loss of control, and forced it all back down, turning away from the others. “Five thinks that my opinion of all of you is irrational. That I’ve been too influenced by people that none of you have ever been able to see. Just because they’re all spiteful pricks doesn't mean they didn't tell me the truth. I creeped you out. My  _ powers _ creeped you out. You avoided me, and eventually that turned into dislike. You each had a favorite in the house, and I was never anything resembling a consideration. And you know what?” Klaus turned back to the shocked silent room. “I was better off for it.  _ Clearly _ . What have the rest of you done all these years? None of you have genuinely accomplished anything for yourselves. Even Allison’s whole career is built off her lies, not anything resembling talent, and now it’s crumbling around her. We’re all assholes, raised by the king of assholes, and that’s  _ not _ something I plan to cling to. Just because none of you have ever had decent support in your lives and want to hold tight to the few memories where you felt you actually accomplished something doesn’t mean I want to be a part of it. I  _ won’t _ be a part of it. Our dysfunction caused the original apocalypse. I don’t plan to stick around to see if we can start a second.” 

Klaus realized that he was trembling, and then he realized it wasn’t just him trembling but the ground as well. He took several deep breaths, and calmed himself. His powers had always been tied strongly to his emotions, and the new lack of control was just adding to the amplification. The shaking stopped, and so did the silence. 

“What the hell was that?” Luther demanded, clearly talking about his powers. 

The other’s objections were much more personal in nature, so he zoned them out. 

“Am I stronger than you remember, Luther? I’ve been hiding it for so long, it feels good to just let it out!” 

“Why didn’t Dad know about this?” 

“You think I would ever let him know my power was more than just seeing dead people? How stupid could you possibly be? What do you think he would have done, huh? Telekinesis, sure. Immortality? How do you think he would train that? You’ve killed me on accident, but his actions would be very intentional.”

“Dad wouldn’t have-” Luther started, but was interrupted by Five’s snort. Yeah, they all knew exactly how it would have gone. 

“Would the rest of you shut up?” he turned to the others. “I’m not interested in commentary. I don’t care if you see the past differently. Sort out your ‘family’ drama in your own time.” He enjoyed the disgusted looks he got when he used air quotes around family. “Actually, you know what, Vanya vented all her emotions without an additional explosion, I think things are fine here. I’m out. I’ll check in tomorrow and make sure you haven’t screwed up before I leave for good.” 

He ignored all additional protestations and started for the door. 

Luther scrambled up from the floor, and moved to block his path - a human wall. Klaus lifted his hand and pushed Luther aside. It wasn’t entirely an accident that a new hole was made next to Vanya’s door. 

“Send me a bill for the damages,” he flicked his Goodbye hand at Vanya. He pushed Luther further down the hall, and strolled out, dropping Ben’s corporeality as he went. Ben had gotten too bold. He couldn’t trust him alone with them after this. 

Klaus was already headed down the street when Ben caught up to him. 

“Why did you do that? You could have healed things! You could have joined them again, we all could have been a family again!” Ben was yelling. It had been a while since he’d managed to muster the passion for an actual yell, rather than a subdued whine. It’d be amusing to leech the ‘spirit’ out of him again. 

“You know exactly why. You think things have changed so much in the past week? Nothing has happened to change my mind about them. They’ve been utterly predictable, and I’m over it.” 

He was still moving forwards, when suddenly it felt like all sound was extracted from the world. He stopped, and looked around. Ben was still whining, but everything else had stopped moving. It was like he was in a frozen moment of time. 

He silenced Ben with a thought, and caught the sound of footsteps, booming compared to the quiet. 

Klaus turned around, and paused at what met his sight. The newcomer was shaped like a human, but rather than a head, it was just a fish tank with what appeared to be a goldfish inside. He was dressed in a long, black trench coat, boots, and gloves, with a tiny, round hat perched on the top of the domed glass. 

“Who are you?  _ What _ are you?” Klaus asked, as Ben finally caught on that something was happening. 

“Klaus Hargreeves,” the stranger said instead of answering. It was a distinctly masculine voice with an echoing mechanical quality. The pattern at the bottom of the bowl appeared to be a speaker. “You have certainly caused quite the commotion. I admit, we didn’t really expect this outcome.” 

“You’re Commission,” Klaus recognized. “What, intergalactic goldfish division?” 

“I don’t blame you for not recognizing my species, considering yours lacks for advancement. My name is Carmichael. I am a Shubunkin. And yes, I work for the Commission. Did you think we would not notice the destruction of the 50’s outpost?” Klaus squinted at the… man? Fish? Agent? Whatever. He stared at the potential enemy, searching for his dead, but whatever this time bubble was, nothing had followed him into it. He assumed that if Ben hadn’t been so close to him when it was activated, he’d be frozen too. Interesting. 

“Maybe I was counting on it. You must be upper management, no? I was wondering how to get access to you. I have a bone to pick, you see,” Klaus reclined against the front of the closest building, an electronics store. The fish guy probably thought it was quaint, considering the technology he’d brought with him. 

“Yes, we looked into that. Your case was badly handled. You were very misjudged. Your threat rating should have been much higher. If you had not already taken your revenge, I can sure you a great many of their number would have been punished for their inattention. One of the first lessons we teach our number is that any interaction in the time stream causes ripples. Your case was more like a wave.” 

Klaus crossed his arms. “So what, you would have done things differently if you knew how I’d react to Dave’s death?” 

“Of course. You see, I  _ have _ done  _ my  _ research. A man of your talents, of your… enterprising personality and liberal morals… You would have been a great asset. You still could be.” The agent’s movements were weird. He was human-shaped, but used very different body language. He spoke American English, but the accent came out wrong, like it was being strung through … well. A goldfish bowl. He was moving his arms while he spoke, although the movements looked uncomfortable rather than fluid. 

Klaus sneered in disgust. “You think I would ever do anything for one of you, after what your people did? You try to divorce yourself from them now, after it’s already been done. It’s a case of too little, too late.” 

“You haven’t even heard my offer yet,” the fish spread his arms wide, like a showman. That was certainly a gesture Klaus recognized. 

“What could you possibly offer me?” Klaus demanded. “The only thing I want is already gone, because of you people!” 

“What if I told you that we could save him? We could bring him back for you.” 

“What?” Klaus stalked forwards, abandoning the building. Everything was already still, but it felt like his whole world had narrowed to the being in front of him. 

“Klaus, don’t listen to him. He has to be lying!” Ben exclaimed. 

“You’ve seen the extent of our technology,” he gestured at the world, frozen around them. “Reviving one human after something as simple as a gunshot wound? Easy. Normally we wouldn’t bother with something so trivial, but…” Carmichael trailed off. 

“What would you want in return?” Klaus read between the lines. Everything came with a price.

“We bring David Katz back, and you trigger the apocalypse. Once it is certain that all life on Earth has truly been eradicated, we will return him to you and you can live out the rest of your natural lives either in the time of your choosing, or on one of the planets under Commission control.”

He ignored Ben’s protestations, and took a moment to truly think about it. Dave, alive and whole. He didn’t care where they were, so long as they were together. They could even go right back to the moment everything went wrong, live out the life they had planned together… They would have just enough time for a full life before the end of everything. “How could I be sure you would fulfill your end? I’m not Five. I don’t intend to live in the aftermath and scavenge for scraps.” 

Carmichael tilted his head, then nodded. “I am a man of my word, and I will take you for a man of yours. If you agree, we will pull Katz from the timeline now, and you will accompany me to the facility that will revive him. You can see that he is truly alive, and then we will return here, to this moment. If you do not fulfill your end, I can assure you his second death will be significantly messier than the first.” 

Klaus pretended to think it over for several moments, careful not to look too eager. Ben was trying to state all the reasons it was a horrible idea, and told him that he couldn’t do it, but Klaus had years of experience at zoning him out. His decision had been made the moment he heard that they could save Dave. 

“Are there any specifications on how this extinction event needs to occur? Does it have to be Vanya, like the original timeline?” 

“A man of details. I appreciate that in our agents. No, it is not necessary that she be the bomb. In the original timeline, she was the easiest of you to trigger. This time around… I’m sure you’d make an equivalent event.” 

Vanya’s powers were explosive in their very nature, it would be so easy for them to turn outwards for decimation. Klaus’ … well. Death was death. He’d used the dead for his own purposes for years, but something like killing billions of people… He wasn’t sure that would be enough. Maybe he could inhabit Vanya and trigger her powers himself? Or apply the extra strength his recent death had given him, and use his telekinesis… Could he trigger an earthquake large enough to rip the tectonic plates apart?

“And the others?”

“What others?” the agent seemed confused.    
“My so-called siblings. Do you have something in mind for them? They already know the apocalypse is meant to happen tomorrow, and Five can jump through space and time without one of your little devices. They also might be prepared for me. I can be responsible for almost 8 billion lives… I can’t guarantee they’ll all be killed in the event.” 

“You’re not bartering for their lives?”

“There’s only one life I care about, and you’ve already promised it to me,” Klaus shook his head. 

The fish-man thought for a moment before speaking again, raising a finger to tap on the glass of the bowl like a man might tap on their chin. “If they escape, it’s no great loss. We will already be working to rebuild a facility on Earth, one less accessible this time. They can take up the task of following your siblings, if they make it out.” 

Carmichael seemed to recognize that his decision had been made, and extended a gloved hand. 

Klaus left it hovering for a few moments, then grasped it firmly. 

He would do anything for Dave. 

Dave Katz’s body went missing en route to the main base where it would be prepared to be shipped back to America. Klaus was gratified to see that his instructions had been listened to - someone remained with him right up until they loaded him onto the truck with all the other casualties of war. The device Carmichael used was much more sleek than what Earth’s outpost had. It was a disk on the front of his life support suit, and once both Klaus and Dave had contact with it, they flashed away. 

The Facility was built out of a material Klaus didn’t recognize, but it was alien, so that wasn’t too surprising. Dave’s body was delivered to what he could identify as an operating room even if he didn’t recognize the implements. No one forced him to leave the room while they worked, which was good. He would not have allowed himself to be moved. 

He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, Carmichael an immovable object beside him, before the instruments picked up a healthy heart beat. Dave was alive. 

The doctors and technicians confirmed that the operation was a success, and that was when a hand pressed heavy against his shoulder, and he found himself in his hotel room back on Earth. 

“Wait!” he cried, but it was too late. 

“Remember the deal,” Carmichael spoke. "We've done our end. He's alive, and he'll be waiting for you once everything is over. If you change your mind, or back out, or begin to consider double crossing us, consider this," he held up a small box and pressed a button. 

“Please, why are you doing this to me?” A female voice rang out. “I don’t understand… P-please, I haven’t done anything wrong!”

“Why should I care about your hostage?” 

“Because right now I’ve got two agents with their weapons trained on Katz’s biological mother, two days before she is to give birth. You screw this up, we won’t just kill the guy sitting in our labs so that you can have a merry ghost reunion. We’ll make it so he never even existed at all.” The alien nodded with a distinct sense of finality, and then he was gone too. 

Klaus stared at the space where he had disappeared, and then sat heavily on the bed. He was sitting in the dark, no lights on in the room, and no light coming in from outside - it was evening now. 

It didn’t feel entirely real. The knowledge that Dave was out there, and alive. For the first time since he had witnessed Dave’s death, he reached out and tried to grab Dave’s spirit. His power spread further, and further, reaching, grasping, but coming up empty. Dave’s spirit wasn’t on Earth or in the Afterlife. 

Klaus had an apocalypse to plan. Maybe he could use a timeless classic… make humans go the way of the dinosaurs. 

  
  


April 1st. The perfect day for the end of the world. Honestly, who would believe it? What came first, the decision to end the world on this date, or April Fool’s Day? He could ask Carmichael later. (Although… they’d never really discussed  _ how _ Klaus would be leaving the planet after everything was over. Would Carmichael pop in once things were set in motion, or would he wait until Klaus was dead too? He didn’t really want to see how he would come back from a planet-destroying catastrophe. Fatal wounds being the only thing to recede left quite a bit of room for error. He had been so busy thinking of Dave that he’d forgotten to think about himself. The sensation was… novel.)

He waited until noon before he left to meet back up with the others. They would be his biggest obstacle if they caught on that his goals had dramatically altered. He needed to keep up appearances, and keeping them close was his best choice at the moment. 

Ben still had not rejoined him, so he assumed his wayward brother had gone back to Vanya’s. He had probably spent the night screaming futilely in their siblings’ ears. 

It wasn’t a very long walk, and on the way he watched as everyone went about their day. They had no idea it was their last. He wondered if they would make different choices if they knew. Like the couple standing in the middle of the sidewalk, arguing over expenditures, or the man hiding a wedding ring behind his back as he flirted with a much younger woman. The teenager leaning against the counter of a convenience store, bored out of their mind at the lack of customers. The older woman, limping her way down the sidewalk with a heavy bag in her arms, people swerving around to avoid her. The beggar, holding out an empty palm as people turned their eyes away. The dealer, lurking in an alleyway. Humanity. 

He reached Vanya’s apartment building and chose to stop thinking about it. He was just glad no one in the Academy had mind reading as a power. 

He made his way up the stairs, and he could hear them before he even reached the door. They had used a blanket to cover the Luther-shaped hole in the wall, but it did nothing to block out sound. 

“How can we be sure that you’re right?” that was Vanya speaking. 

“We’ve been talking about this for hours! Eudora wouldn’t lie about what she heard!” came from Diego. 

“What she claims Ben heard, you mean,” was that anger in Vanya’s voice. “Why would he change his mind?” 

“There’s only one thing he cares about right now, and we aren’t it,” Five’s tones of superiority rang out. “We already knew that. He only hopped on the apocalypse train because the Commission took something from him. If they managed to convince him they could give it back…” he didn’t finish. 

Shit. 

“It doesn’t matter why, only that we need to stop him,” Luther spoke. 

“And how do you plan on doing that? You’ve seen how powerful he is now,” he could practically hear Five roll his eyes. 

“Whatever it takes,” Luther grumbled. 

Klaus felt enraged, and when he opened his eyes again, he was over a foot taller. 

“My name is Luther, and I’m against murder, except when it’s someone I claim is my brother. I want to try killing him a third time, just for funsies!” 

He cancelled the connection as the others all turned to look at him in shock. 

“Wow, Luther,” Klaus walked in through the unlocked front door. There was no point in locks when there was a massive hole right next to the door. “Tell us how you really feel!”

“What - I didn’t - that wasn’t,” Luther stuttered out, before turning to glare out Klaus. “You!” 

He’d never actually pulled that trick without killing the person he’d controlled, so he wasn’t entirely sure what Luther had experienced, but he was pretty sure that Luther didn’t actually know so much as suspect based on comedic timing. 

“Me what? It seems I arrived at the perfect time!” he glanced around the room, and saw the positions were fairly similar to how things had been the previous day. The only difference was that Patch was back. He knew he had been forgetting something. Ben was standing next to her, his arms crossed as he glared at Klaus. He cut the power he’d forgotten he was channeling into her. That had certainly been a massive oversight on his part. 

“How did you do that?” Luther demanded. “That wasn’t me talking!” 

“No, but it’s what you were thinking, isn’t it? Come on Luther, finish your original thought! Whatever it takes! You didn’t want to kill the stranger that we  _ knew _ was going to start the apocalypse, but when you suspect something about me, it’s the first thing you jump to! You’re a massive hypocrite!” 

“Why don’t we all just calm down, and you can tell us whether Ben heard right,” Diego suggested, standing and moving over to him. “You’re not actually planning on starting the apocalypse, are you?” 

“Don’t be crazy,” Klaus shook his head. “Why would I do something like that? You heard me yesterday, I’m only here to make sure it  _ doesn’t _ happen.” He was a very good liar at this point, he knew that, and he could see hesitation spread across his siblings’ faces. Not Five’s though. 

“Patch said they promised you your boyfriend back. She said Ben told her you left with the agent they sent,” Five spoke. 

“And I told you that the dead are awful, spiteful creatures. They crave destruction, they don’t try to prevent it,” Klaus shared. And generally, that was true. He turned to where Patch was still standing, unseen by the others. “What the fuck?” he demanded. 

She looked smug. “Ben found me right after you left. I was still at the station… they were strangely reluctant to listen to me identify my own killer, but finding the gun on the guy’s body helped. I assume that you leaving is what made it so no one could see me again, but later that night, presumably when you came back, so did my ability to touch things again. We came back here and told them everything.” 

He had honestly entirely forgotten about Patch. Under normal circumstances, if he was making a ghost solid, he felt it as a constant drain. With the new well of power… he hadn’t even had to think in order to maintain it, no matter the distance. Apparently, going to a different planet was too far, but on Earth… How far was his limit now? It’d definitely be something to experiment with once this was all over. 

Allison waved a hand, catching his eye, and she held up her notepad. “IS IT TRUE?”

Looking around the room, he knew even if he said no they wouldn’t just take his word for it. Not at this point. Five and Luther were convinced, and they would always be bigger obstacles than the others, albeit for very different reasons. 

“Is it true? Am I actually planning on causing the apocalypse when only yesterday I was glad I had managed to stop it?” he paused dramatically. “Okay, fine. So what if it is true? What are you going to do about it? You could do as Luther suggests, take extreme action against me. You work together, somehow manage to subdue me or get a lucky shot in, and I wind up dead. Then I get up, extremely pissed off, and you’re right back where you started, only I have more of a reason to want you dead.”

“You’re actually-”

“What the fuck-”

“How could you-”

“I told you-”   
“Oh shut up, all of you. If it wasn’t me, it would be someone else. You should know that better than anyone, Five. There’s no truly stopping the apocalypse. What’s meant to be is meant to be, as the Commission is so fond of saying. The apocalypse is always going to happen, was always going to happen. At least this way I’m getting something out of it,” Klaus waved a hand dismissively. 

“How could you even say that? How can you be so -” Diego’s voice cut off, his emotions getting the better of him. 

“You have to know that they won’t follow through on their promises...how could they?” Five stated. 

“And that’s where you’re wrong Fivey, they’ve already given me what I wanted. Dave is alive and well, and he’s waiting for me on the other side,” Klaus gave his brother a genuine smile. 

“And you think he would be okay with this, with you destroying everything on his behalf?” Ben asked. 

“Shut your piehole, Ben,” Klaus rolled his eyes. 

“Why are we even still talking about this? We won’t let you do this,” Luther crossed his arms. 

“And what, you’re going to stop me?” Klaus snorted. “As I said, good luck. You’d be better off using this time to say your goodbyes. I was planning to wait until Vanya’s concert, let her have her big moment, but I can start sooner, if you like.” 

“You’re going to kill everyone, kill all of us, for some guy? How long did you even spend with him? There are other people out there! You could find someone else!” Vanya was crying, and a light bulb burst in one of the lamps. 

“I’d rather have one more day with him than a lifetime with the rest of you,” Klaus laughed. “But hey, I did ask, and none of you specifically have to die. I mean, it’d be easier for you to escape if you hadn’t destroyed the mansion and the two time travel devices inside it, Vanya, but Five might still be able to take at least one or two of you along with him. You should be fighting over that instead.” 

He could tell Five was going to move before he actually did, and he spun around with a hand extended, freezing Five in place. He had a knife pointed towards where Klaus’ back had been. 

“Actually trying to stab me in the back, bro? That’s hilarious.” 

That seemed to be the cue for the rest of them to move as well, but he caught them with his telekinesis before they even got close. He could feel them push against his control, but they were no match for him. 

“Is this going how you expected, Luther? How are you doing, Number One?” he patted Luther’s cheek, even as he clenched his teeth and tried again to shove himself forwards. “What use even are you, big guy? You couldn’t keep the original team together, you won’t have the opportunity to reform the new team, and Dad didn’t just send you to the moon to get rid of you, he also killed himself to escape you. You’re a failure. You’ve always been a failure. You aren’t Number One because you were the best of us, you were One because your mother gave you up the easiest. The first baby Hargreeves acquired. Maybe she knew what the rest of us now know - you’re worthless.” Pushing Luther through one wall hadn’t been enough to sate his anger. It took very little thought before he was flying out of Vanya’s apartment again, only down into the street this time. He was super resilient in addition to super strong, so he didn’t think a fall from only two stories would do too much damage (more’s the pity), but it got him out of this room at least. “There are things I could say to the rest of you, too, but we covered all that last night. I don’t care enough. Luther will die here with everyone else, but if the rest of you want to try Five’s powers, now’s your chance to decide.” 

Klaus left the apartment, not releasing his grip until he was already gone. Instead of going down, he went up, to the roof. From the edge, he could see Luther pulling himself to his feet, looking determined. That wouldn’t do. He pulled Luther into the air, up, up, up, then dropped him again. The concrete cracked, even as bystanders began to gather and point. 

So much for waiting until evening. 

Oh, well. Carmichael had never specified a time. 

Klaus reached for his power, seeking out the place the Veil used to be. It came to him as easily as it ever could have. He could feel the dead, even now - especially now, and they were  _ delighted _ . He wasn’t exaggerating when he said they craved destruction, and they could feel that was his intent. He had never truly struggled with his power over them, but it was entirely different to feel that they were facilitating his purpose. He hadn’t entirely decided how he was going to do it, figured that the way would become clear once he was in the moment, and he was right. As he reached further into himself, he could feel a place he hadn’t known existed. It was very similar to the aspect of Vanya’s power which had destroyed the mansion. He had reached out to undo the damage then, but now he would be doing the same thing, on a much larger scale. 

“For you, Dave,” Klaus whispered, as he closed his eyes and unleashed the wave. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Klaus opened his eyes. The world was entirely white around him, blinding. He couldn’t orient himself, he was floating, suspended in space. There was no end or edges in sight. 

“I warned you,” a young female voice echoed throughout the space. “I told you! You broke the balance!” 

He… he recognized that voice. “Are you still using the same form as last time? You really liked being a little girl that much? Because I have to tell you, it wasn’t one of my favorites.” 

“Shut up!” The voice was much louder, and he had to work to prevent himself from wincing. “You’ve ruined everything! This isn’t how things were supposed to go!”

“You’re the one who gave us free will. Technically, that makes it your fault,” Klaus shrugged, lacing his fingers behind his head as though he were reclining comfortably. 

“You can’t do this.” 

“From where I’m sitting, it looks like it’s already done.” 

He reached for his power, prepared to break back out of this space and return to his body like he had last time, but froze in shock when he came up empty. There was nothing there. 

“What did you do?” he shouted, demanded. “Where are we?” 

“We’re in my realm, this time. Not yours. This was your idea, remember?” She sounded smug. 

“So what? Why am I here? What is your plan? You can’t keep me here forever - you don’t like me, remember? How long do you think you can stand my presence before you want to kick me out?” 

“I don’t plan to keep you here forever,” She sounded angry. “Just long enough to fix things. To fix what you broke.” 

“Oh yeah? So what, you’re team anti-apocalypse? Because I have to tell you, I shouldn’t be your target, the assholes at the Temps Aeternalis should be.” 

“This isn’t about the  _ apocalypse _ ,” She yelled, and wow, ow, that hurt. “This is about  _ you _ and your complete lack of control! Your abuse of your power!” 

“The way I see it, you are creation, but I’m destruction. I was only doing what I was built for.” 

The space dimmed slightly, and Klaus thudded to where a ground now existed. Rude. God was now standing in front of him in a physical form, the one he was expecting. 

“Your domain is  _ death _ , not destruction. Each of the 43 was given a domain, although not all of them survived to maturity. You, however, are the only one who overreached. This version of you. I never liked you, but this version is by far the worst.” 

Each of them had a specified domain? “So, what? Five’s has to be space, Ben had his Lovecraftian horror connection, Vanya’s is sound… Luther is what? Physical strength? Allison alters reality itself with her rumors… what’s Diego’s?” 

“Does it matter?” She scowled. 

Klaus shrugged. “No, not really. I’m more interested in going back.” 

“You can’t go back. There’s no back to go to.”

“Right, Earth’s destroyed. So what? Send me straight to Commission headquarters. You get rid of me, and I get to see Dave more quickly.” 

“You’re not getting it. You didn’t just break one planet. You poured the realm of the dead into the realm of the living. They were separate for a reason. You didn’t destroy Earth, you destroyed the Balance. You broke  _ everything _ , including your precious Dave.” 

“No… That’s not possible,” Klaus felt cold all over. 

“I  _ warned _ you,” Her face was twisted into an awful grimace, and normally he would crack a joke about it getting stuck that way, but for once he didn’t feel like joking. 

“But… But you’re fixing things, you said,” he exclaimed. “How are you fixing things?”

She crossed her arms. “I’ve had to start over. Start it all again. Only this time, the world will exist with one less bloodline, and you will never have the opportunity to turn into,” she waved a hand at him, “this.” 

“You’re going to write me out of existence?” he demanded. 

“Not you. You were created for a reason… The 43 were created for a reason. It was a… venting, of sorts. A release.” 

“Then what? Not… Not Dave?” 

She shook Her head again. “You’ll be as you originally were, had you never met Frank.” 

“What, so my life - I won’t - I won’t exist anymore? I’ll be that sad, pathetic thing from the Commission’s files? I don’t want that!” 

“You’re the one who started this! You don’t get a choice. It’s already done. You won’t even remember. Now, get out of here!” She pressed Her hand against his chest, and shoved. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Klaus groaned, rolling almost off his bed entirely. 

“You alright?” Ben asked. 

“I had the weirdest dream. Sobriety sucks!” 

“You’re doing this for a good reason, so you can see Dave again. Why don’t you go downstairs and join the others? They’re all celebrating. We made it to April 2nd!” 

Klaus rolled his eyes, his hands going to the dog tags hanging from his neck. It had been a nice dream, until the end. Actually being powerful, being in control. If only his own power was more than being tormented by the wraiths who delighted in screaming his name. 

And speaking of - one of the nannies was outside his door, her voice reaching an octave that shouldn’t even exist. Klaus groaned in pain, pressing his hands hard against his ears. 

“Shut up!” he yelled, and a pillow went flying from his bed, impacting the door. 

Klaus and Ben both stared at it in shock. 

Huh. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Carmichael is a character straight from the comics. 
> 
> And that was all she wrote. 
> 
> This is all I have planned for this series/universe. There's a few alternate endings/outcomes that I might post at some point, if there's interest (like, what if he HADN'T torn his way out of the realm of the dead? Who was waiting for him? How could things have gone?), if there's interest. I'm also definitely willing to take prompts/whatever, if you have something you'd like to see.   
> But for this specific series? This is The End.   
> I do have other UA ideas that I might also publish at some point, like a Hazel/Klaus ship I just can't get out of my head, or a story where Klaus's ability to not die is discovered by the Handler pre-2019, and he's recruited by the Commission in exchange for a solution to his ghost/addiction problem. ((There's also a Misfits/UA crossover I'm not entirely sure where I'm taking, because Klaus and Nathan absolutely need to meet, but with those two involved? What even is a plot?)) But I like a story to at the very least be mostly written before I post it, so as not to disappoint readers with lack of updates. 
> 
> Anyways.   
> Thank you to everyone who has made it this far. Thank you for all the kudos, and comments, and bookmarks, and really just all of the love everyone has shown me. Love you all.


End file.
